Local history has shown that when fire hydrants don’t work and fire apparatus is sent to put out a fire, this is the ultimate bad situation.
This very situation existed in Chelsea in the days before the Great Fire of 1973.
And when the city was literally burning down in October of that year, many of the hydrants firefighters went to tap into did not work.
The result – a conflagration driven by wind and to an extent, by the lack of water pressure and working hydrants.
None of us expect such a thing to happen in Everett, where it was reported to the Common Council by the fire chief that 35 hydrants are not working out of the city’s more than 700.
When five percent of the city’s hydrants aren’t working, it should be regarded as a public safety issue of the first order.
We would urge the fire chief to make greater haste than waiting for September to get the obvious repairs going for the hydrants that are not presently functioning.
Time is of the essence in this important situation.
While it is good that the location of these faulty hydrants are known, every hydrant must be in working order or our public safety initiatives here aren’t worth the paper they are written on.
Bottom line, the city needs to repair these dead hydrants with speed, before the unthinkable happens.
Because once that happens, then it’s too late.