Pipe Leak Leaves Students Without Hot Water
By Chris Hessel Residents of Roosevelt Quad and Dewey, Baruch and Eisenhower of Kelly Quad were without hot water from Sept. 8 until Sept. 10. The problem was caused by a leak in the high temperature hot water system adjacent to Greeley College, which provides heat and hot water services for the residence halls. Workers ran into some delays trying to identify the exact location of the leak. The steel high temperature hot water piping in the system is surrounded by a Ricwil Piping system, which is another insulating pipe. When the steel pipe leaks, the water travels in the space between the two pipes, which causes difficulty in locating leaks. The leak in the pipes in Roosevelt Quad was 50 feet away from where workers originally thought, said Ken Fehling, director of residential operations. Once the leak had been located, the area's hot water needed to be shut off so the piping could cool down to make the repair. The piping is capable of reaching temperatures of 300 degrees. Students said the problem occurred a few times last year. "I have friends who are upperclassmen and they advised me that this situation happens at least once a semester,” Morgan Murray wrote in a Facebook message. She is a freshman resident of Stimson. In a separate Facebook message, sophomore Mei Chen of Wagner wrote that this wasn’t the first time she experienced a hot water outage. "It happened like five times last year." “The students are correct,” said Fehling. "This happened at least three times last year.” Though the leak was fixed, Fehling warned that “another leak can crop up at any time.” The university is trying to identify long-term solutions for the pipe situation. |
