Frigid temperatures at the beginning of January led to a spike in calls to the City of Winnipeg for frozen pipes within homes.
Between Dec. 29 and Jan. 4, there were 52 calls for internal plumbing. In the three weeks prior to that the City of Winnipeg documented eight calls a week regarding internal plumbing.
City manager of water services Tim Shanks told CTV News that calls for “internal plumbing” would likely be related to crawl spaces, basements, or uninsulated or unheated areas of a residence where pipes could freeze.
To protect their homes, the city said residents should insulate pipes and areas containing pipes, weather seal windows and air leaks and set the thermostat no lower than 12°C.
In the same period between Dec. 29 and Jan. 4, there were also nine calls for frozen ground pipes on property belonging to homeowners, and four calls for frozen pipes on property belonging to the city. That’s compared to zero calls in either category for December up to the 20th.
When asked whether it was uncommon to see a low volume of calls for pipes freezing underground, Shanks said the bulk of thawing operations normally happen between late winter and spring because of the depth of frost in the soil.
Shanks also said the city was expecting an “average” year for thawing operations, and said it wouldn’t compare to 2013/2014 when the department was inundated with calls.
“Since then we’ve made a bunch of changes in our equipment, changes in the infrastructure in the ground, improved our workflow process. We’ve been able to keep up with really cold winters,” said Shanks.
