A water main break outside Shippensburg University’s Ceddia Union Building (CUB) early Saturday forced officials to turn off water for a few hours.

The leak affected the water supply to the CUB’s bathrooms, water fountains and dining services. Maintenance workers shut off the water at noon and turned it back on after they located and fixed the break. 

Water spilled from an unknown source beneath Cumberland Drive near Franklin Drive, which was closed while a maintenance crew located and repaired the break.  

Once workers determined where the water leaked from the pipe, it was a simple matter of digging out around the pipe and fitting a brace around it. Then, they flushed the system through a nearby fire hydrant. Finally, they filled the hole in with dirt they excavated.

Ed Gutshall, the mechanical shop foreman in the Physical Plant Department, estimated it would take five to six hours to find and repair the leak. In the end, the repair was complete by 4 p.m. Saturday.  

Workers at the site said this was the third time in the past three months that there had been a water main break on campus. They blamed the breaks to the aging infrastructure of the 150-year-old university, and guessed the cold may have had something to do with it. 

University police contacted Jeffrey Kugler, the associate director for maintenance and operations at SU, with information about the leak at around 10:30 p.m. Friday night. Staff needed to wait until they received approval from PA One to excavate the area this morning. 

The physical plant employees worked from noon to 3 p.m., according to Kugler. The temperature held around 33 degrees throughout the afternoon.

“These are the people that make all the professors look good,” Kugler said. “You don’t think about modern conveniences until it breaks and needs to be fixed.” 

The hole workers excavated is now filled in and covered up. Vehicles are able to access Cumberland Drive.

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