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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
City hall officials are still trying to figure out what caused a water main break Sunday that is still leaking water onto 49 Street.

City public works employees Des Reddick, left, and Adam Hynes suck out water from a manhole so they can access valves beneath the street and shut down a water main leak on 49th Street. - photo courtesy of Chris Greencorn

A large section of the street quickly became covered in ice as 2,000 to 3,000 litres of water spewed from a gutter at the Stuart Hodgson Building and flowed down to the intersection with 51 Avenue. Municipal enforcement officers were seen laying pylons Sunday, and traffic was reduced to one lane on 49 Street.

The source of the problem had not been found yesterday.

There have been a "higher than normal" number of water line breaks this winter, at least 30 since Christmas, said acting public works director Chris Greencorn.

"I don't know if we are reaching record highs but it has impacted this year's work," he said.

Greencorn said he was impressed with the response time from city work crews, who were called in after a resident spotted the leak and then posted a video of it on social media. City councillor Cory Vanthuyne forwarded the footage to the city, and workers were on the scene within 20 minutes, Greencorn said.

Water pipes typically break either because they are too old or because of cold weather, said Greencorn.

He said in the coming days the city will try to pin down the source of the problem and what the associated costs might be.

"What (work crews had to) do is find the downstream manhole and suck it out in this case because it was full of water," said Greencorn.

"They will turn the valve off to stop the leak. Because we have multiple feeders in the downtown core, we can isolate this until we can repair it."

Nonetheless, Greencorn doesn't anticipate the broken line will affect water service in the city.

"It can be repaired without much disruption to service because we have multiple pipelines through town," said Greencorn.

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