Residents and business owners on Scott Street’s 200 block had water and heavy machinery on their doorsteps this morning as a water main break under the street had water running out of the road near the Salvation Army Thrift Store.
Manager of Operations and Facilities for the Town of Fort Frances Travis Rob says the Town was alerted to the leak early Tuesday morning and set to work managing the situation during the overnight hours.
“About 2 or 2:30 a.m. we were alerted to a water main break on Scott Street, we got some barricades out and did some work to control the flow and control the water that was coming out through the road,” he said.
As the incident progressed the leak was located and crews got to work on the issue this morning.
As of the Times conversation with Rob this morning crews had reached the problematic pipe and were in the process of making a repair. According to Rob, simply put, there’s a hole in the pipe.
“There’s a couple of services close by that are going to make the repair a bit challenging, but it’s very much manageable,” he said.
“We’re down to the pipe now, which is half the battle. We know what’s wrong, so we’ll start to make the repairs and everything should be back up and running later this afternoon or early this evening.”
Following repairs the vicinity affected will be placed under a boil water advisory. Affected properties will receive notification from the Town if they’re affected.
Until the Town can assure that the water is safe the advisory remains in effect.
“There’ll be a drinking water advisory on, we will take samples, send them off to the lab, it’s just precautionary. This is our standard practice for water main breaks. The people affected directly, it’s not the whole town, the people that are affected directly will be delivered notices that will have the information they need,” Rob said.
As soon as we get clear samples back from the lab we will inform the people that need to know that everything has been cleared and they can go back to regular water use.”
Among some of the affected businesses are Flint House and Turtle Island Cafe and Barber Shop. According to its Facebook page the Flint House will be closed until further notice and Turtle Island is not able to serve coffee but barber services remain ongoing.
