Are you seeing red or orange water coming out of your cold water fawcett right now? Well, turn it off right away and I’ll tell you why.
You are one of the lucky houses near fire hydrants that our Fire Department opened and closed earlier today. According to Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) when they do this the high pressure dislodges all the rust in the pipes and it takes hours for it to settle back down again.
Running your cold water tap just makes the symptoms worse and last longer. The best way to make this pass is by using as little water as possible so that the rust settles and the water runs clear again in a few hours.
Ugh, is that really your tap water, or did you leave a hefeweisen out in the sun?
Seriously, that must explain what happened to my water pressure when I was showering this afternoon.
Yup, that’s our tap water. This has happened before when a water main burst but this is the worst I’ve seen it. The water finally ran clear about 7:30pm tonight. I’m leaving the water to settle to see how long it takes.
The hydrant opening that I saw was less than 10 seconds so
I don’t know that it was the direct cause of the water pressure problem.
Our water smelled heavily of chlorine yesterday and today, I wonder if that’s related? Every time they over-chlorinate, it makes me (and my girlfriend) quite ill. I guess it’s time to get a Brita.