Joe Kabangele came home for lunch one day in January 2016. He went to wash his hands, as is his daily routine, turned the faucet and nothing came out.

He said their house was without water for more than four hours and they had no idea what was going on.

“It was really hard for my wife,” said Kabangele. “The only water she had left was in the pot on the stove.” She couldn’t do anything, he said, not even give their daughter a glass of water.

Kabangele couldn’t wash his hands before he ate that day.

Hand washing aside, this is not an isolated incident for Ottawa, according to an analysis of a database that the city uses to document service requests. Rideau-Rockcliffe, the ward where the Kabangeles live, logged 50 complaints of no water and no temporary service in 2016. Somerset and Kitchissippi logged slightly more.

Number of no water, no temporary service complaints in 2016

No temporary water service complaints mean that the water was shut off for an emergency, so there was no time to hook the residents up to a temporary water service. While there are a number of reasons for emergency shut offs, according to a statement from the city, they occur most often because of watermain breaks. Other causes include freezing or concerns of water quality.

According to the city, there were 22 watermain breaks in Rideau-Rockcliffe in 2016, with just over half of them occurring during the winter months.

“There are a number of factors that can contribute to watermain breaks,” said Carol Hall, program manager of water distribution with the City of Ottawa in an interview. Those factors include the age and material of the pipes as well as the water temperature and frost level.

“Historically, we experience 74 per cent of our total watermain breaks on these older metallic pipes,” said Hall.

Kabangele said that he thought his water was shut off due to freezing. This could mean the service pipes connecting residents to the watermain froze, or it could have been one of the watermain breaks during the winter that year. The city was unable to confirm reasons for specific residents losing access to water.

The city of Ottawa is making strides to lessen the number of complaints of no water by correcting the issue of watermain breaks. They’re doing so through a program called the Cathodic protection plan.

The plan involves placing charged pieces of magnesium metal, called anodes, on the water pipes in order to drive corrosion away from the pipes and into the metal pieces instead.

In the spring and summer of 2016, the city installed these anodes to pipes across the city based on the “frequency and severity of watermain breaks in Ottawa over a five year period,” according to the city’s website.

Rideau-Rockcliffe was among the 11 wards to receive the Cathodic protection plan, including the Kabangeles’ street.

Number of installations of the Cathodic protection plan in 2016

Hall noted, however, that while this plan helps to slow corrosion, it “does not prevent further failure.”

Rideau-Rockcliffe experienced 4 watermain breaks in the month of January 2017 according to the city. As Hall noted, there are other factors that play into watermain breaks other than the conditions of the pipes.

The Kabangeles have not gone without water since last January.

“Thankfully,” said Kabangele, “that was the only thing that happened.”

Since then, every time Kabangele turns on the tap to wash up before lunch, there is water flowing through the faucet.

Featured Image courtesy of the Rideau-Rockcliffe Community Resource Centre.