By Jessie Weisner

Local frozen water pipe numbers double from 2018

Mar 6, 2019 | 4:15 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB — The low temperatures beginning in February have been destructive, causing dead car batteries, bad roads conditions, and frozen water pipes.

In fact, the city has responded to more than double the amount of frozen pipes than last year.

Since the beginning of February, the city has repaired 107 frozen water pipes within Medicine Hat, compared to 48 in 2018.

“What we’ve found mainly is it’s internal plumbing and exterior water services that are freezing up,” says Brian Graham, manager of field operations for the City of Medicine Hat.

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Those can be internal plumping problems all the way to major external water services, which takes more resources and heavy equipment.

“At one location it can be an internal problem which we can solve pretty quickly but if it’s an external frozen water service,” says Graham. “That can take a lot longer, a lot more time and effort and equipment to actually get that sorted out.”

City crews have been out full time repairing pipes, aiming to repair 6 areas on Wednesday alone.

Although temperatures are warming up by next week, residents still need to take precautions to keep their pipes working, because the extreme cold weather has driven frost deep into residential water pipes.

“Although it might get warmer in the next few weeks the frost might go down a bitter deeper yet so make sure you take those precautions,” says Graham.

Graham says the best thing to do is run your water every day.

“The first thing to do is keep your heat on, and if you are going to go away for a weekend or a holiday, make sure someone checking your house on a daily basis, if you can possibly have someone run a tap, the cold water tap, for a few minutes, that prevents the lines from freezing when you’re away.”