Fire spurs county action

A fire that consumed Wasatch Junior High School Monday would likely not have escalated to a six-alarm blaze if water pipelines were up to code, Salt Lake County officials said Tuesday.

Antiquated piping and low water pressure in the area prompted the County Council Tuesday to create a special improvement district in Millcreek to update water pipes and replace the dead-end grid with a loop system.

While it is a move that solves a decades-old controversy and comes despite some residents' objections over expense, officials say the unanimous decision was long overdue.

"It's a sad example of exactly why we stressed this need," said County Councilman Michael Jensen, who is the deputy chief for the Unified Fire Authority. "It' a significant loss to the community, to the neighborhood. That's why the code has been updated."

The $13.8 million special improvement district will put a 20-mile looping series of 8- and 12-inch water mains and add about 350 new hydrants to the area.

Although Wasatch Junior High is four blocks east of the new district's boundary at 2700 East, Jensen said the improvements could have significantly reduced the time to put out the fire as well as the manpower called out for the job.

Unified Fire Authority Capt. Gaylord Scott said water pressure in the area dropped to 700 gallons per minute at times Monday, far below the standard 1,500 to 2,000 gallons per minute.

"I'm not trying to blame the city. All I'm trying to say is that we didn't have enough water," he said. "It's just that simple."

Six-inch pipes in the area were also smaller than the standard 8- to 12-inch pipes required by standards set in 2000.

"Any upgrade to the water system is an upgrade for everyone," Scott said. "We're safer. You're safer."

Because of that low pressure, Jensen said, firefighters were using a relay system to pump in water from up to 2,000 feet away. But as they did that, the water pressure from the existing lines dropped even further because of the dead-end system, he said.

United Fire Authority Chief Don Berry said he knew his team was going to have problems as soon as they heard the fire was on the valley's east side where older neighborhoods mean older water mains and outdated systems.

"We've dealt with the problem for many years," Berry said. "In any area where you have small pipes and a lack of hydrants, you could have the same thing we faced yesterday."