As Massachusetts thaws out from last weekend’s deep freeze, plumbers across the state are still playing catch up on all of the calls for burst pipes.
At Baker Elman Plumbing in Newton, they received close to 700 calls over the weekend. Most of them were for burst or frozen pipes. They are trying to get to all of them, but they only have six plumbers working at their Newton location.
“We’re bringing one plumber up from the Cape to help us out, but even that’s not enough to keep up. As soon as they finish a job, we have to move them to the next,” Kathleen Heavey said, who was manning the phones Monday.
NBC10 Boston followed along as one of their crews responded to a home in Newton Monday. The family who lives there spent Sunday night with no heat or water.
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“We heard a loud noise, like a big bang, so that must have been something that burst. Then we came out and there was water everywhere,” homeowner Nicoletta Noor said.
Plumbers had to spend several hours at the family’s home because they kept finding more burst pipes.
“I think we have found four so far and we’re not done,” plumber Peter Goodrich said.
Business owners are also being affected. A burst pipe forced the emergency room at Boston Medical Center to close over the weekend. Little Donkey in Cambridge had to close one day over the weekend because of a pipe burst. As of Monday, Coolidge Corner Theater in Brookline was still closed because of a pipe that had yet to be fixed.
As the plumbers work through a long list of calls, many residents also have water damage as a result of the pipe bursts. They said the wait for restoration companies is even longer than the wait for plumbers.
