99-year-old water pipe ruptures in San Francisco; water service restored to 9 streets

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- The Dewey traffic circle was partially shutdown and residents on nine San Francisco streets lost water service because of a water main break.

The break happened at 6:30 a.m. Wednesday.

"This morning, I took the usual route and noticed the street was closed and said I need to go around. So I just went around the long way. I know my way around here so I just kinda went the big circle and parked over there. It was an extra 3-4 minutes," said Leonardo Calderon, who was taking his kids to school at West Portal Elementary.

Crews couldn't fix the break right away because first they had to find it.

They used a correlator, which pinpoints the leak by sound. They also drilled in a few spots so they can get underground to try and see the spot. They located the break around 10:30 a.m. at Dewey and Taraval. Officials said it is an 8-inch cast iron pipe that has been in place since 1920.

Residents say this is the second water pipe to break in the area in the last eight months.

"It's getting to be annoying especially because this is a very busy circle. For us residents, it has been very upsetting," said Judy Yoro.

After they located the break, officials announced they would be shutting of the water while they make the repairs. The following streets in the Miraloma and West Portal neighborhoods were impacted by the outage:

Montalvo Avenue, Magellan Avenue, Kensington Way, Vasquez Avenue, Garcia Avenue, Edgehill Way, Ulloa Street, Portola Drive and Juanita Way.

West Portal Elementary School did not lose water service.

Water service has been restored to those areas after being shut off for several hours.

Water officials say San Francisco has 1,200 miles of water pipe. They have a goal to replace 15 miles of pipe per year.