Water damage, repairs drive spike in plumber demand
Long after Houston thaws from its historic winter storm, many people whose pipes have frozen and burst likely will face extended waits for repairs as plumbers across the region report unprecedented demand.
Pipes have been bursting across Texas since Sunday night, creating a nightmare scenario for plumbers, who said the storm has had far-reaching impacts — unlike anything they’ve seen before. As power outages continue, frozen and broken pipes are hitting many people with a double whammy — no running water. Getting pipes repaired will be a challenge in the coming days, even after temperatures rise.
“We expect to be booked for two to three months,” said Vince Horvath, a master plumber at Best Plumbing, a company that services commercial properties such as apartment complexes.
Plumbers are seeing flooding from burst pipes in basements, drenched ceilings collapse from attic water lines and wet walls, said Horvath.
“We haven’t seen the worst of it yet,” he added.
Pearland-based Epic Plumbing received more than 400 calls by 4 p.m. Tuesday, according to manager April Maly. Right now the wait time for service is about two days.
“Our phones have been ringing off the hook since yesterday,” she said.
“Houston wasn’t prepared for this,” Maly said. “(Freezing pipes) don’t ever happen here.”
Roto-Rooter had more than 238 open requests for service Tuesday afternoon in Houston, said the company’s spokesperson Paul Abrams. The demand in Houston has been much larger than the other major Texas cities the company works in, Abrams said.
On a normal day, there are 25 Roto-Rooter technicians working in Houston. On Tuesday, only five of the company’s technicians in the region were able to work, Abrams said, because they were handling their own winter storm emergencies or facing unsafe road conditions.
Kelli Victorian, marketing manager for Village Plumbing and Air, said her team had received 300 calls by 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, crashing the phone system.
Tom Pierce of Tom Pierce Plumbing said Tuesday morning he was working 55 calls and was too tied up to talk.
Vicki Mendez, office manager of Chavez Plumbing on the Northside, said her crews were busy turning off water at the street to try to prevent damage when frozen pipes thaw and adding insulation under pier and beam houses with pipes that hadn’t frozen solid yet.
Erika Chew, office manager of Houston Plumbers, said she’s been getting about double the number of calls the company normally receives.
In areas that commonly experience cold weather, pipes are wrapped in material to prevent freezing. Another challenge at the moment is fixing PVC pipes, because it’s too cold for the glue required to dry. The heat guns plumbers use to warm copper pipes can’t be used on PVC because they melt plastic.
“It’s kind of like working with our hands tied behind our backs,” said Abrams.
The damage plumbers are seeing this week far exceeds what they responded to during the freeze of January 2018, said Horvath.
“After that freeze, we were still repairing back flows into June and July,” he said.
Not much can be done until after the weather warms, Maly said.
“You can try to use a heat lamp to warm the area around the frozen pipes,” she said, adding that method may not be successful and those who don’t have power don’t have that option.
Pipes can burst once they thaw or while they are still frozen, said Maly.
“Either one is a hard fix,” she said.
On top of the cost of fixing the pipes, the damage from the water to building and personal property can be more costly, Horvath added.
“A burst pipe can unleash 200 gallons of water in a short amount of time,” said Abrams. “It can be catastrophic to a home.”
When the weather warms, more pipes are likely to burst, said Abrams. He suggests those with frozen pipes turn their main water shut-off valve and open up all faucets so they will drain. Abrams added that people should at least familiarize themselves with where their water shutoff valves are so that they can quickly turn them off in the event of a burst.
The cleanup that will likely be required once more pipes begin to burst in warmer temperatures will require large high-wattage industrial fans, which will put further strain on the state’s electrical grid.
Many people will likely be displaced due to water damage, he added. Often those repairs require residents to be out of their homes.
Ann Shetler said she awoke to frozen pipes in her Pearland home around 4 a.m. Tuesday. About 30 minutes after the power returned, she started checking faucets.
“There was a big gush and then a big boom,” she said. “I could hear water running downstairs and I thought, ‘Oh that’s good.’ Then I realized it didn’t sound right.”
When she went downstairs, water was raining down from the attic through air vents. Shetler quickly shut the water to her house off at that point, minimizing the damage. The mother of two was able to get a hold of her regular plumber, who responded less than an hour later. By the time the plumber left, Shetler said he had 70 new calls to get to.
The homeowner said she isn’t worried about her pipes freezing again, as long as her power stays on.
The property damage and the hazards of braving the cold without power are inconvenient, but Shetler said she can weather those aspects of the storm.
“I managed 30 hours without heat; I can handle that as an individual human body,” she said. “But I’m furious that rolling blackouts ended up being a broken grid. … I think a lot of us have a million questions, and this time we want real answers and real change.”