No Running Water! Emergency Preparedness to the Rescue!

We had a problem early last week. We didn't have any running water. Late Monday morning, I heard Molly barking so I look out the window to see what the problem is. I don't see anything that would require barking but what I do see is water bubbling up in my front yard!

So I go out front to look at it. Yup, it is bubbling up. I try to shut the water off at the meter by the road, but it was stuck so I shout for my husband to come do it. A few calls to some plumbing companies, and a few hours later, we had a team on their way. In the meantime, we don't have any water. Well, as I informed my husband, we do have water, we just don't have any coming from the tap. So I start to pull out some of the water that I store for emergencies. (You can see a post on how you can store water here.)  If our great-great-grandparents had to 'fetch' their water every time they needed it, it really wasn't going to hurt us to do the same for a while. 

Here's the water station I set up in the kitchen.

Here is water station for the bathroom sink. I put one of these bottles in each bathroom. I also store water for flushing the toilets and that container went into the bathroom as well.

Well, the final result was a break in the main water line to the house. I was afraid that it was going to require digging up the entire front yard but the leak was at a junction, the line itself was fine.

I was canning green beans that day and I forgot to take a picture of the hole in my front yard while the plumbers were working on the line. However, here is a picture of the spot now. (Unfortunately, they didn't do a good job of 'saving' the grass to put back on top of the dirt.) By the time they were finished, it was dark. I took this picture the next morning.

As you can see here, they added an 'access box' that will prevent the need to dig up the yard if something like this ever happens again. All in all, we went about 12 hours without water. Not a crisis, but an emergency nonetheless. 

The lesson here is that emergency preparedness isn't just for severe weather. It is for anytime 'normal' conditions are not present. When you prepare for emergencies, you can ride them out without missing a beat!