THUNDER BAY -- Some residents of a northside Thunder Bay neighbourhood were waiting Wednesday to have their water service restored to normal following an overnight break in a pipe.
The rupture occurred in the Cowan Street area of Current River, near Hodder Avenue, and affected about 25 homes..
A spokesperson for the city's sewer and water department said it happened at approximately 7:30 Tuesday night.
"With the cold that we've had lately, and now that it's warmed up a little, just the ground movement breaks the pipes. It happens every year," said supervisor Richard Dawson.
The city had to close the street down with a barricade to allow a crew to do repairs.
A resident told tbnewswatch.com Wednesday morning that water service was still cut off at her residence.
Dawson said the city did shut it down completely for a time because the leaking water was causing damage, but "once we got it under control we opened it back up a little," with the result that some affected customers in the area were able to get water out of their taps even before the completion of repairs.
He expected the watermain break to be fixed by late Wednesday afternoon.
Residents affected by the break are advised to boil their drinking water for the next two or three days as a precaution.
Dawson said that, on the whole, this has not been a bad winter for broken watermains within his jurisdiction.
"We had one that started on Sunday and we didn't fix it until Monday. We've had a few but not a lot this year...I would say it's below average" on the north side of the city, he said.
