This photo shows the repair made to the intersection of W. Wenger Road and Union Boulevard following the repair of a series of water main breaks that caused rapid depletion of water in Englewood’s water towers.
Ron Nunnari | The Register-Herald
ENGLEWOOD — City officials were stunned and without an answer as to what caused five water mains to break in one day in fairly close proximity to each other.
Three failed in the intersection of Wenger and Union roads, a fourth in front of Wright-Patt Credit Union a few hundred feet south on Union Road, and a fifth failed on Westerly Hills Drive roughly two-tenths of a mile east of the Wenger and Union intersection.
All five failed on Tuesday, June 4.
“We had an extremely rare occurrence that happened last week, and there is no explanation for it,” said City Manager Eric Smith during the June 11 city council meeting . “We had five water main breaks in the area of Union and Wenger, all at the same time, and our water towers were being rapidly depleted.
“Fortunately, our service center crews jumped in and some of them worked until midnight and beyond to take care of those main breaks,” Smith said. “We have searched high and low for a reason as to why it happened, and we don’t know. Everything was normal from the source supply.”
Smith said there were conspiracy theories floating around and some speculation that there was some shifting of the substrata below ground that caused the water mains to fail.
“I know that sounds bizarre, but we can’t come up with any other reason – so it could have been a minor earthquake for lack of a better term,” Smith said. “We appreciate the hard work of the service department to get them fixed.”
Mike Coate of Coate Construction came in and fixed the water main on Westerly Hills.
“The good news is that they are all repaired,” Smith stated. “In all my years of experience we have never had five main breaks occur simultaneously.”
Smith has served as city manager for more than 50 years.
Service crew members told Smith that the water pipe was vibrating, like the hammering effect you can experience in your home’s pipes when you turn the water off too quickly.
What caused the water pipe to vibrate the way it did is unknown. There is no record of the fire department accessing a hydrant during that time period. The entire event remains an unsolved mystery.
Reach Ron Nunnari at (937) 684-9124 or email [email protected].
