Plumbing & frozen pipes in thePacific Northwest

I live in the Seattle area, and, for the past couple of days we have had an arctic air front hovering around, creating colder than normal temperatures. Lows in some places have even gone as low as the teens, although the lowest I've seen at our house is 21F.

Late this morning, I happened to glance out the front window of my house, and saw a river of water running down the driveway on a sunny, clear day. What the -- I went to check to see if the spigot for the outside hose had burst. When I opened the door to the garage, I discovered a small waterfall from the ceiling. The water was running under the garage door, and out.

Fortunately for us (at least, this time, the floor is slightly slanted, and the door doesn't seal shut completely, or the garage would have been ankle deep in water. Instead, there was just a little pooling. I turned off the main water valve (which, coincidentally, we had replaced last year after it sprung a leak and caused all kinds of damage inside our home, since it is, ineplicably, in the hall closet) and called my husband, who was in Canada for the weekend. He happened to be driving, and turned around and headed home.

After digging fruitlessly for the business card for the plumber we'd used before (who had someone at our house in 90 minutes on an evening phone call), we finally figured out the name, and I called. They have been busy with emergencies for cold complications (mostly burst pipes), but he was able to promise someone in four hours. Then I called the drying people, who had done an amazing job preserving our hardwood floors.

Turns out it was -- you guessed it -- a burst pipe. And, surprise! it was plastic (well, pvc), even though the exposed pipes in the garage were copper. So they will replace a majority of the pipe. The good news is, we were able to turn back on the main water valve, because there is a shutoff valve in the garage for the exterior water fixtures, so we can use the toilet. And the sink. And the tub.

Of course, this doesn't happen very often in other parts of the country where the weather is sub-freezing for most of the winter, and people insulate their pipes and bury them. But it's an added cost most people (and builders) think isn't necessary here.

So, thank God for plumbers! And for people who specialize in drying out saturated wood so preserve the integrity of a house. Because, otherwise, we would all have to rely on our own ability, or lack thereof, to fix our own leaks.