ONANCOCK, VA — An old pipe beneath the Ames Street bridge in Onancock sprung three leaks Sunday. This resulted in a town-wide water outage, forcing local businesses to close and leaving residents without water pressure.
Town officials issued a 48-hour boil water advisory as public works employees worked for hours in icy conditions to fix the leak.
Town Manager Matt Spuck said Onancock has a small but dedicated staff of about ten employees.
"When things like that happen, it's sort of all hands on deck," Spuck said. "All of our public works. I put my boots and my coat on and we were down there working to solve the problem."
Spuck said community members came together to support the town's response to the leaks.
"One person called a buddy who had an aluminum jon boat and he said, yeah no problem I'll meet you there," Spuck said. "He met us at the ramp within five minutes and stood on the boat all day long."
The three leaks in the pipe drained water from Onancock's 300,000-gallon water tower. Under normal circumstances, water stored in the high elevation of the tower's bowl utilizes gravity to generate pressure. This allows water to flow easily through pipes to customers.
Sunday's leak was significant enough that the tank drained below the critical elevation of 111 feet, resulting in the loss of water pressure.
Mallards Restaurant was among many local businesses forced to close on Sunday. Owner John Morrison, also known as the restaurant's musical chef Johnny Mo, said his staff adapted Monday to stay open and serve customers.
“We're not using our soda gun because obviously we can’t boil that water, but we've been giving out complimentary bottled water,” Morrison said.
Spuck said that the boil water advisory was issued out of an abundance of caution.
"You can imagine that the leak didn't have any infiltration of bacteria because it was flushing out its strength and there wasn't anything coming in," Spuck said.
Spuck said the 48-hour advisory gives the town ample time to verify the safety of the water and outsource additional testing to the Virginia Department of Health.
Public works said they have successfully closed off both ends of the pipe beneath the Ames Street bridge.
Town officials expect water pressure will return to normal levels quickly.