Planning urged to stop water main break issues in Maple Creek

Water main break, 200 block of Maple Street, November 20Water main break, 200 block of Maple Street, November 2023.

Maple Creek News

Planning needs to start on replacing Maple Creek’s water mains, according to the Town’s interim director of operations.

Andrew Stevenson’s call comes in the wake of three major water main failures on Maple Street in the last three years.

The latest break occurred about six weeks ago. The previous ones were in 2023 and 2024.

“Nearly all of Maple Creek’s water mains were replaced in the early 1960s, with asbestos cement pipe, having a service lifetime of 50-60 years,” said Stevenson in a report for Maple Creek Town Council’s October 14 meeting.

“Considering that we are already past the life expectancy of said pipe, I urge council to start planning capital projects for water main replacements, beginning with Maple Street.”

In his report, Stevenson gave a summary of last month’s break near the Salvation Army.

He said at 3.49pm the water main under the 200 block of Maple Street suffered a “catastrophic failure”, with a large section blowing out of the bottom quarter of the pipe.

The water plant sent an alert, and the block was isolated at 3.57pm.

“Fortunately, we knew exactly where the relevant main valves were located, because that same block had to be isolated for a similar reason in 2023.”

In the eight minutes before closing the valves, more than 45,000 litres – or 9,900 imperial gallons – of water pounded out of the pipe into the ground, at a rate of 97 litres per second. To put this in perspective, a fire hose puts out 20 litres per second.

Both distribution pumps were running at 97 per cent, said Stevenson, and were able – barely – to maintain distribution pressure at the set point of 2.9 bar, or 42 psi (pounds per square inch).

A depressurization notification went out and a precautionary drinking water advisory issued.

Shortly after 4pm, the public works crew arrived to start excavating for the repair.

“A section of asphalt was removed, and one main valve opened slightly to see where water

would come to surface. After two of these tests, the break was located and the backhoe and

hydrovac were able to expose the main.”

“A 70 cm (27 inch) section of the pipe had blown off the bottom west quarter of the

main, and damage extended to either side of the separated piece. A 2.0 m section of pipe

was removed, and a replacement fitted with Hymax repair clamps in its place.”

Stevenson said the line was pressurized, flushed, and returned to service at 1am on September 12.

Bacteriological samples were taken and submitted on September 14 and 15, all of which were returned clean.

The precautionary drinking water advisory was rescinded on September 17.

“This is the third major failure of the water main on Maple Street in the last three

years. Notably, the first failure in front of the Legion Hall depressurized the entire town in

November of 2023, with a break very similar to the most recent one. The second failure

was at the south end of the 300 block of Maple Street in October of 2024, with a slightly less

dramatic mode of failure. Our working theory is that the 200-300 blocks of Maple Street

were from the same factory batch, and that is why the failures are so close together and so

similar.”

Councillor Tina Cresswell said she appreciated Stevenson’s report for the information it provided about what can happen when residents are asleep.

“Sometimes we hear about these water breaks and we don’t know what it really means, what it really looks like, how many man hours actually went into it. To know the extent of this break and just the sheer volume of water that was escaping from that pipe every minute, or every second, was amazing.”

Councillor Cresswell believed it was at about 4am that workers got the break under control.

Councillor Betty Abbott, whose real estate office is near the scene of the break, said: “It was phenomenal – the way it was coming at us. That has to be way faster than any flood that we’ve seen. It was huge.”

Councillor Abbott was impressed by the speed with which the 200 block of Maple Street was isolated after the break.

“These guys deserve a big thank you,” she said.

Michelle McKenzie, the mayor, agreed, saying workers in public services deserved respect from everyone in the community.