Dangerous Dry Hydrants in Lincoln

A balcony on fire and a building at risk: The precious tool to save them is just feet away, but it's useless.

Two fire hydrants were worthless on Monday, and crews had to take extra time to close a street and run hose to a working hydrant. By doing this, they lost valuable time.

"It's very much a concern for us when we have an active fire and a search and rescue scenario,” Jeanne Peshalek, Lincoln Fire and Rescue.

The core of the problem may be confusion. There are actually two different types of fire hydrants in the city: public and private.

The public ones are all red and line city streets every 400 feet or so. Each of the 11,243 are checked every year by the Lincoln Water System. The private ones look a little different.

The faulty hydrants at the lodge apartments have a white top. That signifies they are private hydrants. That means the property owner is responsible for maintenance and repair.

According to the city, there could be hundreds if not thousands of these private hydrants in Lincoln.

10/11 News spoke with management at the lodge, and they said they had no idea those hydrants were theirs.

They were unaware they needed to check them out like a common faucet or shower head in any one of their apartments.

Fire inspectors only check them out if there is a complaint. The manager at the lodge said she's been there for years and never had an inspection because she thought the city handled it. It’s learning experience she says other complexes need to know before the same thing happens to them.

Lincoln Fire and Rescue says they will be working with the Lodge to figure out exactly what happened and why those hydrants were dry.

Management at the lodge said now that they know the hydrants are their responsibility; they are working to come up with a scheduled inspection plan with either the city or a professional plumber.

From Source: http://www.nbcneb.com/home/headlines/Dangerous-Dry-Hydrants-in-Lincoln-318003961.html