‘Major leak’ forces Iqaluit to shut down water system for repairs
Officials urge people to avoid creek near Astro Hill because of high volume of water
The City of Iqaluit will be without piped water on Saturday afternoon when the city shuts down its system to make repairs following a “major leak” at the Astro Hill complex early Saturday morning. (File photo)
Iqaluit residents will be without piped water on Saturday afternoon when the city shuts down its system to allow for repairs to the water line near the Astro Hill complex.
A city public service announcement issued Saturday afternoon said there will a city-wide water shutdown at 4 p.m.
City communications manager Kent Driscoll added the duration of the shutdown would be “as short as possible.”
Earlier on Saturday morning, the city reported “a major leak” had occurred at 3 a.m. at the high-rise side of the eight-storey building at Astro Hill. The high-rise was expected to experience low water pressure on the top floors. The boarding home had lost water but the city’s public works department was reported to be working on that issue.
The city urged people to stay away from the creek in the area because the large amount of water had made it “very unstable” until the water freezes.
Excellent.
I’m glad I had no notice. I didn’t actually want to cook all this stuff I prepped in advance when I thought I would have running water all evening .
I. Love. Pizza. Pockets….
It’s crazy how this city fails to communicate on either their website or Facebook page something so critical that impacts a large part of the city. When everyone’s water line freezes into their home, who is paying the bill to have it water picked? Surely the City of Iqaluit can do better than this!
It’s now 9:15 pm. We’re five hours into a city wide water shut off that, as far as I can tell was a complete surprise. I may have missed something, I’ve hardly looked too deeply but it seems like the shut off was announced on Facebook after it had already began and ten minutes prior here.
I had no water set aside. I needed water to make dinner. We’re out of toilet flushes. This feels familiar.
Kenny Bell, where are you, oh right not mayor anymore, now what do we do.
Does the city have a communication department or someone tasked to update us?
Why is it so difficult to get any kind of updates! Their website Facebook page do not have any updates.
APTN reporter is covering this and it should be out tomorrow before 5pm ?
There are people who are not using facebook or who are not glued to it 24 h a day, so in any event Facebook should not be the only way to communicate important news like this to citizens. It looks like it was a bit of an emergency that had to be dealt with urgently with or without communication (although the problem was identified at 3am, water shut down at 4pm) but still, some people may not have had friends warning them and spreading the word to them. The city’s communication on all these water issues has been problematic, not just for this. Sometimes info is on facebook public service announcements, sometimes city facebook page, sometimes city website, problems reported by citizens about water leaks are dismissed etc. I get the problem is not simple and perhaps staffing is inadequate… but is the city trying to identify its water and water communication issues to come up with a strategy to deal with them? Or are its staff too overwhelmed to step out of the day to day problems? What help do they need?
Maybe it is groundwater?