Home » News » News Briefs » Water pipeline breaks

Water pipeline breaks

A break in the Lake Huron water pipeline, which feeds into the London, broke near the water treatment centre in Grand Bend early Monday morning.

According to Pat McNally, general manager of the environment and engineering services and city engineer, by Monday afternoon the cause of the rupture was still unknown.

Officials expected the pipeline to be fixed by Tuesday afternoon.

In response to the lost water supply, more water was directed to London from a treatment station at Lake Erie.

“We believe we have the emergency plan, staffing and materials to undertake a repair in 24-48 hours,” McNally said Monday. “If our repair looks like it will take longer we will step up request for public restraint.”

“Within London, no one is without water. Some may be experiencing changes in pressure as we re-route flows,” McNally said.

Municipalities affected by the break included the London, Bluewater, South Huron, Lambton Shores, Lucan Biddulph, North Middlesex Centre and Strathoy Carradoc.

The areas surrounding London were not as lucky. Some residents experienced outages, as their local distributions systems were not able to cope with the loss of flow from Lake Huron.

The Thames Valley District School Board was forced to close six schools outside of London due to the break in the pipeline.

—Aaron Codner

Follow the Gazette on Facebook and Twitter.