Residents of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu began to regain their drinking water supply “gradually” on Thursday evening. The City, however, warned that other ruptures were likely to occur during the delicate water replenishment operation.
“Over the next few hours, the population will observe a gradual increase in pressure in residences, businesses and industries,” the City said in a press release released late Thursday evening.
The population was, however, called upon to limit their consumption to personal hygiene needs in the hours following the resumption, in order to avoid overloading the network. She was also asked to postpone using the washer and dishwasher until this Friday.
Since Monday, more than half of the population of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu has been deprived of water after a major pipe break. The rupture occurred during a construction site located at the intersection of Saint-Jacques and Caldwell streets last Monday. The drinking water pipe in question is 75 centimeters in diameter and supplies the Saint-Luc, L’Acadie, Saint-Jean and Île Sainte-Thérèse districts.
The work continued throughout the night from Wednesday to Thursday and the welding of the parts was successfully completed around 4:30 a.m. Civil engineering work then began shortly after 7 a.m. and was expected to be completed by the end of the day.
Only the water supply point will remain open this Friday, that of Carrefour Richelieu, from 7 a.m. to noon. The local state of emergency also remains in place.
The preventive boil water advisory is also still in effect on the west shore of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu.
“When we have water, it will remain important to limit our consumption for some time to come. I understand, it’s urgent for personal hygiene, but I don’t think that early birds will be able to take a shower this evening. As for washing and dishwashers, that will be fine tomorrow,” explained the mayor, Andrée Bouchard.
Other ruptures are expected
The water replenishment operation risks being very “delicate”, also warned the City’s head of infrastructure and water management, Guillaume Grégoire, during a press briefing held on Thursday. “In fact, the probability of finding breakage is very high. But there is no fear that the repair carried out will fail. We have great confidence that the repair is permanent,” he said.
The remaining risk is really that on the rest of the municipal network, due to the opening of the valves and the changes in the direction of the water that there will be, other [ruptures] occur.
Guillaume Grégoire, responsible for the City’s infrastructure and water management
In short, everything is not settled. As for the cause of the pipe rupture, a “post-mortem” will be carried out in the coming days, when the situation has truly returned to normal. “It is at this moment that we will be able to draw conclusions on how it happened, what is the cause, in short what happened,” declared the coordinator of the civil security organization, Jean Arsenault.
Earlier, Wednesday, in an interview with The PressMayor Andrée Bouchard however attributed the break to a possible “vibration” problem linked to an infrastructure site located nearby.
Schools reopened
The 14 schools of the Hautes-Rivières school service center will be reopened on Friday, the organization said in a press release on Thursday. Further communications will be made if schools remain closed, due to the unpredictability of the situation.
The CISSS de la Montérégie-Centre asks people who have a non-urgent medical need to avoid emergencies to allow them to concentrate their resources on more critical cases, the water cut having also affected the activities of the establishment. health.
The water supply to the hospital had, however, returned and “under control” on Thursday evening, the City indicated, adding that firefighters were deployed to the scene preventively with a tank in the event of a drop in pressure. unforeseen.
By email, the CISSS says it is working to plan “the return to our regular activities gradually, in accordance with the City’s recovery plan.” ” From [mercredi], we are postponing non-essential activities in our various facilities. At the hospital, [opérations] and urgent interventions as well as treatments and [opérations] in oncology are maintained. THE [opérations] and non-urgent treatments are postponed. In endoscopy also, only urgent and priority cases are carried out,” it was declared.