Houston isn’t built for twenty degrees.
February 2021 burst more pipes in this city in a week than we usually see in a decade. Here’s what we learned, and what to do the next time a hard freeze is in the forecast.
Why Houston pipes freeze
Up north, water lines run inside heated walls and below the frost line. Here, a lot of them run through the attic, along exterior walls and up into hose bibs on the north side of the house. They were never meant to see a night in the teens, and when the power goes out too, the attic gets as cold as outside.
Before a hard freeze
- Find your main water shutoff now, while it’s dry. Most are in the meter box at the curb. Make sure you can turn it.
- Cover outside hose bibs with a foam cover and disconnect hoses.
- Open cabinet doors under sinks on exterior walls so the house heat reaches the pipes.
- Let a cold tap drip at the far end of the house overnight. Moving water is much slower to freeze.
- If you have an attic water heater or lines in the attic, keep the house heat on even if you leave.
If a pipe bursts
Shut the main first. Then turn off the water heater. A burst pipe in a freeze usually splits where it can’t be seen, and it starts leaking when it thaws, not when it freezes, so keep an eye on the ceilings the morning the temperature comes back up.
During a city-wide freeze every plumber in Houston is booked for days. Knowing where your shutoff is turns a disaster into a wet carpet.
Freeze in the forecast? Book a check now.
We’ll show you the shutoff and insulate what’s exposed.
The emergency plumbing site, built in seven days.
Sixteen pages: a flat-rate price board, the dispatch line on every screen, a slab-leak page written for Houston clay, and the Texas license notice where the state wants it.