A Monday morning fire at Little Lotts Creek Apartments displaced residents of a 20-unit building and the volume of water used to fight the fire caused a pressure drop in the Statesboro water system.
This in turn prompted city officials to issue a notice that brown water from displaced rust deposits in pipes could appear anywhere in the system.
The fire in a three-story building with 20 apartments in the complex on East Jones Avenue was reported shortly after 9 a.m. Most of the firefighters in the Statesboro Fire Department took training a few blocks away and were very responsive. said fire chief Tim Grams.
“When we got there, there was fire on the third floor and in the attic,” he said. “In total, there were 12 homes that were either directly affected by fire or water damage, and things like that of us that fought the fire, and then I think there were eight homes that were indirectly affected.”
In other words, the entire building was affected as water, electricity and natural gas lines had to be cut, Grams said on Monday afternoon.
No injuries were reported
Residents had safely evacuated the building and no injuries were known at the time, he said.
Fire had come through the roof when firefighters arrived, and at first Grams had thought they couldn’t contain the fire, he said. But all of the SFD on-duty crews responded, the city council sought assistance and assistance from the Bulloch County Fire Department, and the fire was reportedly under control within an hour.
“Our guys did an excellent job and got in there and took care of it,” said Grams.
But so much water was diverted to the fire that pressure drops were registered at removal points in the city’s system, including at the East Georgia Regional Medical Center, said Steve Hotchkiss, director of public utilities for Statesboro.
“We received a low water pressure alarm by the end of the hospital, which is not significantly low, but we know when we receive such an alarm that we are drawing water from the entire system and that often a lot of water … stirs up sediments Iron oxide that builds up at the bottom of this pipe over time. “
In the advice of the city it is partly stated:
“Some customers may have brown, discolored water. Avoid hot water whenever possible to keep discoloration to a minimum. If your water is discolored, you can try running cold water for 15 to 20 minutes. … The discolored water is potable, but avoid washing clothes until the water has cleared. “
Using hot water can cause more brown water to flow into a water heater’s tank, where it can be difficult to get rid of, Hotchkiss explained.
But he hadn’t received many complaints about brown water by the afternoon, so the problem probably wasn’t as widespread as he first feared, he said.
Grams did not know the place of origin or the cause of the fire on Monday. Both a state firefighter and his department will continue to investigate, he said.
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