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'A major issue, people not being prepared' | Triad plumber stresses importance of taking precautions ahead of colder temperatures

Roger Kendrick said one of the biggest issues he sees when answering calls is people not disconnecting their hose outside, causing pipes to burst.

GREENSBORO, N.C. — The coldest air of the season is headed to our area, with our first shot of arctic air arriving late Tuesday night and into Wednesday.

There's no better time than right now to prepare your home for these frigid temps.

As cold air moves in, the potential for pipes in your home to burst becomes likely if precautions aren't taken. 

Roger Kendrick is the owner of Practical Plumbing. He said one of the biggest issues he sees involves your outside hose.

Kendrick explained, “If your hose is on the end here, it won’t let the water drain out and that’s why it burst.” 

We have also heard from experts to leave our faucets inside dripping to prevent a pipe from bursting. 

Kendrick agrees that this can be beneficial, but it could also cause more issues depending on if you’re on city or well water.

"It helps, but it can also do harm for the fact being, on a septic tank it’s not made to hold a continuous stream of water. It absorbs through the earth and with all this rain it’s not going to absorb too well. It could also give you more issues a lot of times. Opening your cabinets up does help and let's the heat get to it."

A week ago, a water break happened on Green Valley Road in Greensboro.

Many businesses were without water.

Water Resources Operations Manager, Adam Conn said cold weather could’ve been the cause.

"The cold weather is kind of like a stress test for the water system. Any weaknesses that are out there this adds additional stress to the pipes and it'll find those weaknesses and break. These brakes are going to happen at some point it's just the cold weather accelerates that," Conn said.

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