Waterless in Kansas City

Not sure exactly when it happened yesterday, but our house is currently without water. We know we had water Wednesday morning when I took my shower before work, but when Betsy went to use the sink around 10:45 a.m. there was no water. Everything seemed fine inside the house, and nothing was visible outside until Betsy came back from her errands around 1:30 p.m., when she saw water coming out of the water meter lid in the front yard and flowing down the front slope and creating a significant stream in the drainage ditch in front of the house (for more on the ditch itself, see blogs about the water main break around February of this year).

So we called the city 311 line, and they came out and shut the water off at their water cock.  They found the leak right before the water meter. Which is our responsibility to repair.  In Kansas City the owner is responsible for the pipe from the house all the way to the city water cock at the water main. So we have a pipe to repair, but all the water lost Wednesday never went through the meter, so at least we don’t have to pay for that.

I looked online to find a service that works on water mainline repairs, and a guy came out to look it over at 7 p.m. He’ll be writing up a bid we should hopefully get mid-day today.  No idea how soon after the bid before they can get out to repair it.  I got the idea of soon, but not how soon. Being totally without water encourages priority.

Seems like the line from the water main into the house is galvanized, but the pipe in the house is copper, and the new main, presumably, copper. So he’s going to bid a repair from the street to the meter, as well as one all the way to the house. I know it is going to be expensive, but not sure which calibre of expensive. The main expense is getting the equipment out here, so right now it makes sense to have the whole thing dug up once it is here and replaced. If we don’t replace the whole thing now, we will likely be replacing the rest of it soon enough. Work on one section stresses the next and passes the needed repairs on down the line.