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IQALUIT
A boil water advisory and plea to conserve water was lifted early Sunday afternoon as levels in Iqaluit's reservoir returned to normal.

Water puddled by the breakwater area of Iqaluit after a water main break at Inuksuk High School. Many businesses and schools are closed as the breakage emptied part of the reservoir. - Jeanne Gagnon/NNSL photo

A 10-inch water main break near Inuksuk High School at midnight on Jan. 13 caused substantial losses from the reservoir because the broken pipe was losing more water than the city produces.

Runoff also flooded some areas, especially near the breakwater. City crews were busy draining the excess water into Frobisher Bay on Friday.

As a result, many offices, schools and businesses closed for the day and the Qikiqtani General Hospital was only accepting emergencies.

Mayor Madeleine Redfern said the reservoir was filling up slowly.

"It's filling up very slowly at this point," she said. "It's a combination of either people are using water and therefore it depletes the amount of water we have and/or it's just filling up very slowly."

City crews managed to patch the broken water main and are assessing whether it would hold once the water pressure returns to normal, she said adding it was hard to gauge when the situation would return to normal.

"It's really important people understand and respect the need to conserve water and only use water under very limited and emergency circumstances," she said. "I mean people do need to be able to drink ... but people need to really reduce the number of times they flush their toilets, wash their dishes and they should not be doing any laundry."

What caused the water main to break is still unclear but the water pipe system has valves throughout.

"The valve that is near this pipe has failed in the past and did fail last night," said Redfern. "It made the situation harder to control and deal with because we were not able to use that valve to shut the water feeding that particularly pipe."

Inuksuk High School had been out of water for two days last week but acting fire chief Blaine Wiggins said the issue is unrelated. He added the city experienced four water breaks - downtown, in Tundra Valley, the Plateau and the high school - during a 24-hour period leading to the main water break.

"We had experienced some major issues over the last 24 to 48 hours. It was just another break. It wasn't expected, wasn't identified. It wasn't preventable - just another break," he said.

Wiggins said there is an adequate supply of water for essential services.

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