I saw a City employee flushing a hydrant in front of my house, should I run the water inside my house also?
Categories:
Utilities Operations
Drinking Water Quality
No, the best thing that you could do in that situation is wait until the flushing is done, usually 30 minutes is sufficient; the Utilities Operations Division monitors and maintains the quality of the drinking water in the distribution system through a flushing program. Records are maintained on where we flush, the gallons of water used during the flushing and water quality parameters measured during the flushing process. Utilities Maintenance Division (UMD) also flushes hydrants to test flow rates and functionality of the hydrants; and a City-wide flush is also done annually. During flushing, velocities through the pipes are increased and can dislodge sediment (sometimes caused by corrosion, more often harmless minerals which impart color and / or odor), the flushing removes it from the distribution lines, but if a customer runs their water at the same time, some of that material could be drawn into the business or residence. If there has been a disturbance in the lines (heavy equipment from construction, lightning ground strikes), that same material could be dislodged and could be pulled into the customers’ homes. If this occurs, generally flushing your cold water lines for about 5 minutes will clear it up, if it doesn’t clear it in that time, turn off the cold water lines, wait 20 minutes, and repeat flushing the cold water lines for about 5 minutes – Do not use the hot water lines to flush with, this could draw that material into the hot water tank which could increase the rate of corrosion inside the hot water tank (more than the usual).
Updated 2/5/2021 9:14 AM