An unexpected, tragic water outbreak affected the Mount Washington community.
A main water pipe leaking turned into thousands of people not being able to complete simple everyday tasks.
Over 11,000 members of the Mount Washington community were affected by this inconvenience. A 16-inch main water pipe had leaked, but then slowly turned into a shatter. This all occurred on Monday during the day, around 3:30 pm. The pipe was located 7 feet under the ground on the corner of Bardstown Road and Oak Brooke Drive, at the construction site where the new Wawa is being built. The construction was not working on it when it started leaking. It had to do with the existing info structure and the valve system.
Tuesday, August 19th, Bullitt County schools got shut down for the day because of the incident. Tuesday at 4 am, Jesse Bacon was notified about the issue. By 6 am, he had decided to shut down all Bullitt County schools. There are many reasons for this: air conditioning, water fountains, sinks, toilets, etc. The decision to shut down schools for the day was inconvenient because some high school students had already gotten on their buses. With that being said, they had to be transported back to their homes. Bullitt County schools were back in session the next day, Wednesday, August 20th. The water is still contaminated, so schools were giving out free water bottles to students. “Water being supplied to everyone was critical,” said Stuart Owen.
All Mount Washington residents were quite worried. Stuart Owen warns the residents to stay under a boiling water advisory until notified otherwise. They could not brush their teeth, take showers, get a glass of water, etc. They could not do their daily tasks. With that being said, the police department started handing out water to families, businesses, schools, and anywhere they could. One very important place they knew needed water was nursing homes; there are 4 just in Mount Washington. They had taken the nursing home’s water and porta-potties to help them with the issue. “We did work with the county, Ema emergency management, and the team.” Stuart Owen said.
The 16-inch main water pipe had a small, slow leak in it at first Monday at midday, but it slowly got worse overnight and ended up shattering. The construction crew tried to work on the pipe Monday night, but was not successful and realized it was a bigger issue. Once the right people were called to fix it, they found that there was a steel sleeve around the pipe that had to be worked around when being fixed. They also found that there was a live, unmarked wire near the pipe. With all of the setbacks, it took longer to fix than expected. They had to wait for LGE to mark the wire and shut it down. It took about 24 hours after the situation was detected to make the repairs and restore the water. Tuesday, Mount Washington city hall announced the water had been fixed, just might be low pressure and as well as a boil advisory. They would notify residents when the boil advisory would be lifted. “Water started charging the system around three or four o’clock.” Says Stuart Owen.
