WINNIPEG – The city’s fire chief says four neighbourhoods are most at risk for losing water service due to frozen pipes.
The Earl Grey area, River Heights, Fort Rouge, and the North End St. Johns area were the target of a weekend blitz by firefighters and city staff to deliver flyers warning homeowners to keep their water running to avoid having their water lines freeze up.
Staff delivered 3,903 notices by noon Sunday, Fire Chief Bill Clark said Monday.
“In terms of getting in front of the tsunami rather than being under it, we took action and notified the residents and the properties at risk that there was a danger of their water lines freezing,” Clark said.
City councillors will be briefed on the latest information at a seminar Monday afternoon and Mayor Sam Katz will release more information publicly later in the afternoon.
Clark acknowledged staff were called in on overtime Saturday and Sunday to deliver the notices but said it was worth the cost and regular services and fire protection were not affected.
“I did call in some overtime staff. They were support services staff that generally work in fire prevention and some other civic departments. The goal was to do a blitz delivery to the people in the area to get the message to them very quickly,” Clark said.
Firefighters remain tasked with delivering jugs of water to homes with frozen pipes. That’s done by appointment using regularly scheduled crews, Clark said.
“It’s not that a call comes in and we send a truck out,” Clark said. Deliveries are timed so one truck can make several dropoffs in the same area at the same time. Still, Clark admitted it’s a lot of extra work for fire crews.
“As the situation changes we will re-adjust and alter our process as we need to to ensure we are remaining effective and not overloading any particular station or crews with work,” Clark said.
Comments