Repairs to a water main break in Waterbury have been completed. The main break led to citywide water service disruptions and a boil water advisory in December.
The city restored water service within a week after the main failed, but repairs took longer. Brad Malay, Waterbury’s water superintendent, cited a list of challenges.
“The parts aren't readily available,” Malay said. “The weather was very bad. We were under the crunch to try and get everybody back on the water system. So, we had to make a lot of plans on the fly, but it is done now.”
The water main’s pipes have been replaced, and a temporary solution to allow for waterflow while bypassing the broken main, has been removed.
Mayor Paul Perenereski said the system remains vulnerable to similar incidents.
“As we move out of response mode and back into normal operations, this is the right time to take a hard look at system upgrades that will strengthen our ability to isolate and respond to future issues,” Pernerewski said.
Perenewski is seeking federal and state assistance, especially to help pay for infrastructure upgrades.
“We're north of $2 million on this break, maybe close to $2.5 million,” Perenewski said. “We don't know all of it yet. There's some invoices and such coming in, as you can imagine, a lot of these were emergency repairs, so there was a lot going on.”
U.S. Rep Jahana Hayes previously said she was in communication with the city on additional funding from the federal government.
Meanwhile, the city is working on infrastructure upgrades, including installing valves throughout the system. Malay said the valves would help better isolate failures in the system in case a future failure occurred, limiting the impact to residents.
Many residents who lost water service due to the main break in December were forced to rely on bottled water provided by the city and the Connecticut National Guard.
City officials previously stated they were aware the pipes were in poor condition and had already planned on infrastructure improvements.
Perenewski said around three water mains failed since the original incident but repair crews have been able to return them to service relatively quickly. But he didn’t promise the upgrades would completely prevent such an incident from occurring again.
“We're taking steps to make it even less likely,” Perenewski said. “But it is an old system, and things are going to happen, and people do need, on some level, to be prepared.”
