COLORADO SPRINGS (AP) - Fire hydrant malfunctions at two fires last month are pushing city officials to beef up its hydrant maintenance programs.
While Colorado Springs Utilities has in the past examined each of its 16,404 hydrants on a rotating basis once every five years, the failures have officials moving to a three-year rotation program.
That's after each of the 2,000 hydrants the city considers critical are inspected in the coming year.
Neither utilities nor fire officials report how many faulty hydrants were discovered in the past year, but at least two failures were reported last month.
One, at an apartment fire that killed two on Jan. 16, had a stripped nut that kept crews from accessing the water. Officials say it delayed operations by about 15 minutes, and crews on the other side of the complex did have water from another hydrant.
Another failure occurred Jan. 31 at a house fire when crews found a hydrant frozen shut.
