Three watermain breaks in Kitchener caused by constant weather changes

Kitchener Utilities has reported three watermain breaks have happened in the city within the last 24 hours. Constant weather changes from freezing to warming are the cause of the breaks.

This morning a watermain broke at 16 Craig Dr. with repairs completed as of late this afternoon. It typically takes six to seven hours to repair.

Yesterday a watermain break was repaired at 12 Market St. and another at 32 Dalegrove Dr. in Kitchener.

“Whenever we get a freeze thaw cycle like we’ve seen where temperatures are in the minus tens and then all of a sudden, we start to go into the pluses and it happens rapidly,” said the manager of operations for gas & water for City of Kitchener, Tammer Gaber. “The ground starts to shift and move and that causes any sort of weak spots in our watermains to break,”

Gaber added that they have crews and equipment ready to go whenever a watermain break may occur in the future.

“Last year we didn’t see this freeze thaw like what were seeing this year,” he said.

“We only have about three feet this year, we usually have more than that. So, it takes a lot less time to fix a main break because we don’t have to break through that frost as much.”

When a watermain break happens, Kitchener Utilities will turn water control valves down for safety concerns. Gaber said they will only turn the water off if they find a watermain they have to cut into and will notify residents in the area first.

“Usually, this time of year we get two main breaks a week,” he said. “To get three in a day, we can attribute it to the freeze thaw cycle because the frost isn’t that deep,” said Gaber.

“Once the frost starts to hit six feet, we get a lot of main breaks and were not at that level yet.”

For more information about current repairs being made to watermains around Kitchener, go to Kitchener Utilities website.