CANAAN — Some residents and business owners in Canaan experienced low or no water pressure this weekend amid an ongoing issue with the town’s water line.
Roughly 200 properties rely on the municipal supply, Town Administrator Chet Hagenbarth said in a Tuesday phone interview. The rest of the town, which has a population of about 3,800, uses well water.
The water pressure issue first came to light early last week when John Coffey, who oversees Canaan’s water and sewer system, began to notice a problem with the water line that pulls water from Canaan Street Lake.
The line, which carries water from the lake to a storage tank, was flowing only intermittently, Coffey said on Tuesday. As a result, the water level in the town’s 300,000 gallon tank continued to decrease, as did the water pressure.
After attempting unsuccessfully to repair the line last week, Coffey on Saturday opted to use an older, discontinued line to pull water from the lake.
By then, water pressure in the tank had dropped to a little over 20 pounds per square inch, or psi, when a normal reading is about 75 psi.
The same day, calls started coming in from residents experiencing low water pressure. Coffey estimates the town received over 240 calls in total.
As the town worked to address the problem on Saturday, the Canaan Fire Rescue Department provided water for residents in need, Hagenbarth said.
Poor House Bar-B-Q, a restaurant in the town’s center, was among the businesses affected by the low water pressure, and owner Dan Jameson closed the business for part of Saturday.
“We had some water pressure, but I needed to conserve water,” Jameson said.
Later that day, Poor House reopened for dinner, but service was limited to to-go orders.
After the old line up was hooked up to the tank, houses at the highest point in town had regained water service by Sunday afternoon, “before the (New England Patriots’) game,” he said.
Poor House operated with normal hours of 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sunday.
“By the time we had to do the night dishes, we were back to normal,” Jameson said.
The tank fills about 3 to 5 feet a day. By Tuesday afternoon, it was about 35% full, and the pressure was around 43 psi.
In the coming days, the tank will continue to fill and the pressure will increase, Coffey said, noting that he normally aims for 72-78 psi.
This is the first time such an issue has occurred with the water line, which the town installed about three years ago, Coffey said.
While the old line only goes about 4 feet below the lake’s surface, the new line extends into a deeper section of the lake, roughly 16 feet below the surface, Coffey said.
“Water quality is better in the deeper inlet,” Coffey said.
Water pulled from the old pipe has a brownish tinge, while water extracted with the new pipe has a clearer appearance.
All the water pulled from the lake is treated in the town plant before being distributed, so the water from the old line is still safe to drink, Coffey said. Until the issue is resolved, the plan is to rely on the old line.
The cause of the problem with the new line remains a mystery, though Coffey said ice buildup could be to blame.
Engineers from Horizons Engineering, a civil and environmental engineering firm that installed the line, are working on the problem this week.