My Water Broke

Yesterday, Mrs. Scott called to tell me that a strange fountain of flowing water was coming up out of the ground in the back yard, near the fence, and was flowing into the neighbor's fish pond. Could I please come home from work. The neighbor turned our water main off, and it stopped within five minutes. My parents were on their way over as well. So, I grabbed a pile of work and went home. Just before leaving, my boss diagnosed the problem: "you bought an older home."

I arrived home and we did some investigation. A sprinkler pipe that had been buried by a previous owner burst and water was leaking out. There was a T fitting with both pipes broken off. It was packed with dirt. It had been connected to the sprinkler main in the front yard and was subject to water pressure for four years, at least. It just took four years for the dirt to spring a leak. The dirt was all that was preventing a flood. We capped the pipe off, and I offered the neighbor the cleaning up of the mess. With this discovery, we may be able to use the existing pipes without having to do a full blown sprinkler system in the back yard.