UTILITIES: Emergency repairs ahead for West Seattle water main

5:17 PM: Just received this from Seattle Public Utilities:

Friday evening, May 22, Seattle Public Utilities will begin an emergency repair on a large, 16-inch water main that is leaking in West Seattle near SW Holly Street between California Ave SW and 39th Ave SW.

The repair work is expected to be completed by early Saturday morning, May 23, to avoid construction over the Memorial Day weekend.

In order to safely complete this work, crews must temporarily shut off water to about 65 homes in the area. Impacted customers will receive a door hanger from SPU on May 21 with information about the water outage, which starts at 9 pm on Friday, May 22 and ends at 5 am on Saturday, May 23.

The noisiest construction work will occur between 8 pm and 10 pm on May 22 when crews are breaking pavement to access the leaking water main. However, customers in the area may also experience some overnight noise while crews work to repair the pipe.

During the repair, if customers have questions about the work or their water service, they should contact SPU’s 24/7 Operations Response Center at 206-386-1800.

7:14 PM: We went over for a look and found the NO PARKING signs along Holly in the 41st/42nd vicinity, so looks like that’s expected to be the main work zone.

8 Replies to "UTILITIES: Emergency repairs ahead for West Seattle water main"

  • Gatewooder May 20, 2020 (6:35 pm)

    That’s interesting.   Water has seeped from Holly at California for years.  Google street view shows it as far back as 2011.  Wonder what made it an emergency after all these years?

    • beanie May 20, 2020 (9:13 pm)

      That was my thought also – I wonder if the water I always thought was just seepage from the steep hill was always just a pipe leaking?!

      • Christina May 21, 2020 (8:49 am)

        If water has been seeping from that pipe for that long, there has to be a lot of underground erosion. Maybe they’re worried about erosion damage, which would make sense on a hill.

    • Peter May 21, 2020 (5:45 pm)

      The city has looked into that before. That’s groundwater, not a water main. It’s drainage from the Orchard street ravine, it is not coming from the water main. 

  • Pilsner May 21, 2020 (2:20 am)

    What if the cities own leaking main caused a land slide?

  • AH Neighbor May 21, 2020 (9:30 am)

    Does anyone else in Arbor Heights have an ongoing issue with dark orange matter in their home filter for their incoming city water supply?  We have sent the clogged filters (the latest filter full just 2 weeks after installing a new filter) to SPU Operations.  Our filter system is also new.  The reports came back that our city water supply is safe.  Interesting that the color of the dark orange matter in our filter for city water entering our house is the very same color as the silt in the ditch next to our house.  Is there a leak going into the water supply as well as a leak going into the street??

    • Dee May 21, 2020 (3:13 pm)

      Do you know if your property pipe is galvanized iron? That “orange matter” is likely rust.The city water mains that supply your house are pressurized to the extent that they prevent foreign material from being introduced even when there is a break in the pipe. If you contact SPU, they should be able to tell you what material your city service line is (copper, plastic, galvanized). This is the line from the main to your property pipe. 

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