Pipe Bursts, Affecting 17 Floors, 36 Apartments

Residents of the Apartments at Wheaton Center were bombarded by not only the blizzard but flooding from a burst pipe that leaked through 16 floors—around 36 units in Two Wheaton Center (east tower) Wednesday evening.

Building Manager Christine Pommier said that repair crews are currently assessing the damage to determine what needs to be repaired in which units, and residents who need to stay in a hotel room would be reimbursed.

Greg Prokuski, a resident who lives on the second floor of the building, heard from a neighbor that one of their friends on the 18th floor had water busting through his ceiling late Wednesday evening. "I wasn't sure if it was from the ceiling or the roof from all the snow—(but) I figured we got 20 inches so it couldn't have been from that."

By the time firefighters arrived twenty minutes after Prokuski's call, there was water on the floor the laundry room on the first floor and the heating room next to it, he said. "So in a matter of 20, 25 minutes, it had gone from the 18th floor all the way to the first—damaging 36 units."

The affected units were all in the two east tiers of apartments in the building. Prokuski said residents complained that water came in through the ceiling and electrical sockets.

Repair crews have responded quickly, said Colleen Carrington, a resident on the 18th floor. Carrington said she didn't see where the water came through, but flooding was "bad" on the 18th floor. Repair crews, she added, are "doing pretty good," with tape along the walls and floors marking necessary repairs and centrifugal air movers to dry the units.