City seeks permanent fix for water leak
By Terry Murry on Thursday, June 10th, 2021 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
PENDLETON – A water leak at Northwest Fourth Street and Northwest Furnish Avenue ended up taking crews around 14 hours to install a temporary fix.
“What we thought would be a pretty straightforward shutdown and isolation grew because we kept having water somehow getting past our isolation valves,” Public Works Director Bob Patterson said.
He said it’s possible that the age of the isolation valves could mean they have ceased to work. As a result, the crews had to make the temporary fix while the system was under pressure. They open some fire hydrants on the hill to help reduce that pressure.
“This is all about aging infrastructure,” Patterson said. “The leak turned out to be on an old steel repair band.” Patterson and staff are working on determining the best way to make a fix permanent.
