Cleanup underway after Montreal water main break floods streets and homes

A Montreal city spokesman warns it will be weeks before repairs can be completed on a major water main that broke near the Jacques Cartier Bridge on Friday, flooding dozens of buildings and leaving some 150,000 homes under a boil-water advisory.

All streets had reopened to traffic on Saturday, and an extra garbage pickup was being organized to collect the debris from the 50 homes and around 20 businesses that flooded after the pipe erupted into a dramatic geyser at around 6 a.m. the previous day.

Witnesses described the break as a “wall of water” that shot several metres into the air, forcing firefighters to ask nearby residents to evacuate due to risk of flooding.

City spokesman Philippe Sabourin said there’s a considerable cleanup operation required after the nearly two-metre wide pipe gushed water for several hours into streets, intersections and people’s basements.

“Everything exploded yesterday, including pieces of asphalt,” he said. “The concrete part of the street, it’s completely collapsed. There’s no more sidewalks anymore, so there’s a big hole here.”

Sabourin said it would be at least a month before the break can be repaired, in part because the city doesn’t have all the necessary parts and equipment on hand. In the coming days, he said the city will focus on fixing the street and inspecting the water main before the repairs can take place. He said it’s still unclear what caused the 1985-era pipe to break, only 40 years into what should have been a 100-year lifespan.

One hypothesis is that the water main was exposed to road salt that caused corrosion, “but at this point it’s too early to tell,” he said.

Much of the city’s northeast remained under a preventative boil-water advisory after the rupture caused a drop in pressure, creating a possible exposure to contaminants. That advisory is expected to last at least until Sunday, pending the result of water-quality tests, Sabourin said. “There’s zero compromise on the quality of water in Montreal,” he said.

About 14,000 Hydro-Quebec clients were without electricity on Friday after power to the area was cut, but the utility’s outage map suggested that number was down to just over 300 as of early Saturday afternoon.

Firefighters had asked residents of nearby buildings to evacuate on Friday morning, citing concerns around flooding and structural damage from the water. The Red Cross was tasked with helping the flood victims, but Sabourin said only three people needed emergency housing.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 17, 2024.