Another year, another water war! 2023 RHS Water Wars officially started on Monday, February 27. The game this year is run by juniors Isabella Russell and Rohan Dhillon. Although RHS students are playing, this game is not school affiliated. This year there are about 30 teams, and each person pays $20 through Venmo or Zelle to sign up to play. Each team consists of four players, and each team must come up with a name and picture to represent their team. The deadline to submit teams was February 19, if you still wanted to sign up after that date the fee was $25 to play. The game will last for weeks until the final teams are standing. The last team standing will receive the cumulative money, and it will be split up between each member of their winning team.

The day before the game started, on Sunday, February 26 each player was given one target. Players must shoot their target with a water gun and film it, and get a picture with them afterwards. The video proof must be sent to the Instagram account @rhs_waterwars_23 to get points for their team. It’s a struggle for teams to find information on their targets, and that’s when the account @rhswaterwars23leaked comes in to save the day. This is a private Instagram account that was made to give people information on where players live, where they work, and their job schedules. Then, @rhswaterwarslivelocations was made to update players on the live locations of others as the game continues.

Players constantly have to keep an eye out for other players, unless they are in the designated safe zones. Some of the safe zones are in homes, at school or the school parking lot, work unless you are leaving, sports fields, school events or other special events, backyards, etc. On Monday, February 27, the first day of water wars had begun, the team Ocean Spray got the first kill on one of their targets, senior Rodney Sabbe. Along with that lots of other teams have been getting kills on their targets, as players wait outside people’s houses, where they work, and even their favorite hangouts, just to try to catch them with their guards down. It’s a scary world out there right now for players with Waters Wars currently taking place. Senior Madison Nutter said, “I was lowkey scared to see who was going to show up at my house.” Senior Halle Scholbrock said, “Outside Ray’s house I felt very impatient and annoyed because we went there several different times and every time he managed to get around us and still leave his house without us seeing.”