What Richmonders still need to know about this week's water crisis

The big picture: Mayor Avula has promised to soon begin a "rigorous and transparent post-mortem," he told reporters at a press confrence Thursday.

Zoom in: Here are a few things we still don't know:

• A clear timeline on who knew what and when, including the surrounding counties.
• Why social media seemed to know about the water crisis hours before the public was informed.
• What role aging infrastructure played in the crisis — and why issues flagged in earlier inspections, as reported by WTVR, weren't addressed sooner.
• Why communication was so slow and sparse in the early part of the week.
• If small businesses and workers affected by the water outage will be eligible for some sort of financial support.
• Why the region's waterworks are so interconnected — and if there are there plans to change that.
• If this could've been this prevented.
• How can we ensure this never happens again.

Catch up quick: Richmond's water issues stemmed from an early Monday morning power outage and backup system failure at the city's main water treatment plant during a winter storm, which knocked out the 100-year-old facility.

• Due to interconnected water systems, ultimately hundreds of thousands of residents across five localities were without running water or under boil water advisories, some for more than two days.

• The Richmond airport lost water, too, forcing passengers (and visitors to the city) to use port-a-potties.
• State lawmakers who were already in town for legislative session grappled with the same water issues (and also had to use port-a-potties) when convening briefly on Wednesday to open the session, as required under state law.

The week was also a major test for the city's brand new mayor, Danny Avula, who was just six days into the job when the plant went offline.

• His formal inauguration, originally scheduled for this weekend, has been postponed.