The town of Louisburg is doing its best to form a solid plan with contractors following another water main break Wednesday. Not only have multiple breaks hurt local business, but they have also closed schools twice and have resulted in property damage.
A cable crew accidentally cut the town's main water line Wednesday morning, making it the third time a water line was ruptured during the project. A gas line was also cut.
Louisburg School Superintendent Brian Biermann said all schools were impacted by the break except Circle Grove Elementary School, which is on a rural water supply. The district began notifying parents of the early dismissal because no water was available for lunch, restrooms or water fountains, administrators said.
However, the city of Louisburg says its not the contractor's fault.
"This has happened a few times now just because of a lack of adequate mapping by the city of Louisburg," said City Administrator Nathan Law. "Because of the age of the infrastructure that's in place and the requirements at the time, not everything is buried with tracer wire, which makes it easy to find when locating water mains. And they didn't all make it onto any type of official map for the city of Louisburg."
Water was restored to everyone before 10 p.m. Wednesday.
MP Nexlevel is the contractor handling the project for People's Communications. Yates Engineering is the designer.
Law and other city officials met with contractors and engineers Thursday to work out a plan to ensure another line break doesn't happen. Law also said the city will pay for any damages incurred.
"We're going to make sure everything gets fixed and repaired to his expectations," he said.
Law said they're bringing in more local contractors who know the town well in order to spot older lines that may not be mapped out. They will also be using a special truck provided by Peoples Communications which helps spot existing lines.
"We apologize for any interruptions in service and we do continue to work as quickly as possible to get them back up and running. But as of now everything is up, running and safe," said Law.
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Josh Helmuth can be reached at josh.helmuth@kshb.com
