Water Quality

Hydrant Flushing

The City has an ongoing Hydrant Flushing Program that assures our fire hydrants are in good working order. Continue reading to learn more.

Have you ever been driving in your car and noticed a City worker standing by a fire hydrant with water gushing out?  Have you ever wondered why they're "wasting" so much water? There are good reasons for this activity. The workers you see are hydrant flushing to maintain the safest and highest quality of water possible. The City of Coconut Creek flushes fire hydrants throughout the service area only when required. This program samples and tests the water in the distribution system and identifies when water main flushing is needed.

Hydrant Flushing serves the following purposes:

• Improves water quality in the distribution system
• Verifies the proper operation of fire hydrants and valves
• Helps find weakness in the water system
• Checks closed valves and weak flows in the water mains
• Verifies adequate fire flows for firefighting

Flushing fire hydrants is one of the most important maintenance practices that can be performed on a water distribution system. The time involved in flushing can vary from a few minutes to several hours depending on the circumstances. If you see hydrant flushing crews working in the area please drive carefully and treat them like any other road construction crew.

What do I do during or after hydrant flushing?
Avoid running tap water and using the washing machine or the dishwasher until the flushing is finished. If tap water is used during flushing, it could come out full of sediment that causes discoloration. If you encounter discolored water, shut the water off and wait several minutes. After waiting, check the clarity by running cold water for a few minutes, allowing new water to work its way into your pipes. If the water is clear, it's OK to use. If not, wait a few minutes and check again. There is no health hazard associated with discolored water. In some cases, there may be a slight discoloration for a few hours.

Why can't City residents reuse this water?
This question is a little more complicated. We have received numerous ideas. For example, filling City tankers with water from hydrant flushing. We have, in fact, been working on this concept for quite some time. However, it is difficult to anticipate where flushing will be required and for how long, which makes scheduling a challenge. Unfortunately, we can not move enough water through a hydrant meter into a truck to make a big difference in water quality. Hydrant flushing requires a water flow of up to 1,300 gallons per minute in order to move all of the water in a water main to adequately flush the system. Filling up tanker trucks with water from hydrant flushing would cause too many interruptions in the flow that could compromise the integrity of the water distribution system.