City loses 500,000 gallons of water from leak

PRAIRIE GROVE — The city of Prairie Grove lost about 500,000 gallons of water during a break last week located west of Ditmars Road on Bush Street, according to Chuck Wiley, public works director.

“That is a significant loss,” Wiley said Friday.

The break was discovered Monday, April 29, after the water plant operator noticed a major increase in water use.

Wiley, who was out of town attending a water conference in Hot Springs, said his crews worked for about six hours repairing the leak.

“By the time we repaired the line and flushed the system, we ended up with about half a million gallons of water loss,” he said.

Those on city water use a total of about 650,000700,000 gallons of water per day, according to Wiley.

About 90 residents had to boil their water for three days while the city waited to hear the results of samples taken from the water.

Wiley said he submitted samples to the Arkansas Health Department the next day, Tuesday, April 30. He was able to announce the boil order was lifted after he received the health department’s report in writing late Wednesday afternoon.

Wiley said water breaks happen for many reasons, including normal wear on a water line. The city flushes its water lines regularly to keep the water fresh and flushing causes the water line to move in the ground. If a line is near a rock, after a while that rock can rub a hole in the line, damaging the pipe.

He could not say for sure what caused last week’s leak.