Quite a shock

It was quite a shock when last Friday morning the water bill arrived in the post. Not only was the bill sky-high (approx. € 1150), but there was also a letter attached suggesting that we had a leak somewhere. This leak, if there was one, had increased our water “consumption” in most likely not more than two months from the normal amount of water (based on a yearly consumption of 130 à 140 m3) to approx. 1200 m3.

watermeter in the fore ground, the leak near the house

What to do? We could not think of anything else but phoning the water board, who told us that since the leak was between the water meter and the house we had to find a plumber to repair the leak. Between the water meter and the house? In the Netherlands the water meter is normally located by the front door, hence a leak this size should not be very difficult to detect. Our water meter however is located in a field, at around 150 m away from the house. The pipe runs underground, so where to start?

Sue (in yellow) near the leak

The plumber arrived on Saturday, saw the meter running and promised to return on Sunday to start digging and make the repair. Sue tried to follow the pipe from the meter to the house, in the hope to find the leak. And lo and behold, she found at 25 m from the house, but still in the meadow a place where she could see and hear water gurgling out.
The pictures illustrates the size of the problem quite well: the picture of the meadow was made from where the meter is located; the yellow figure in the distance stands by the leak. The second picture is a cut out from the first one, where Sue (dressed in yellow) stands by the leak.

the leak, a small hole just under the tap

The plumber of course was quite happy that he did not have to dig up 150 m of pipe, and had the whole problem solved within two hours. The leak happened to be a hole in a tap, which was installed in the field for no apparent reason. What rests is trying to convince the water board that we do not want to pay the full amount of lost water….

The link to the website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle can be found here.