The call came in around 7:00 p.m. Friday. It was a small water leak at first, but East Bay MUD says it was a 12-inch main that quickly broke wide open and sent thousands of gallons roaring down the hill.
The water main break even caused a sink hole that swallowed the tire of a fire truck. A wrecker had to carefully pull it out late Friday night.
Most of the water washed into backyards and into garages of about 15 homes. Only one home and one family had to be evacuated.
Jennifer Fischer's house is just one of the homes that got caught in a flood of water that came cascading down from the top of the hill. The only thing firefighters could do is dig trenches and take whatever they could to divert the water away.
Fischer explained to us how a makeshift wall of bricks saved her home. She told us, "The firefighters took up any landscaping that they could and built a makeshift dam so that the water wouldn't go into our house. The water was rushing at a very high rate going down the street and then turning into each property. Our property, everybody's homes were completely surrounded by water, at least two to three feet of water around our entire home. No water inside our home. Just those first two homes at the top of the street were the only ones that were really affected. The rest, the firefighters were able to really help and save our home."
As of 11 p.m. the water main was shut down and there was no water service for the street.
East Bay MUD says it still doesn't know what caused the water main to break.
