You may have noticed the hydrants in town are starting to look a lot sharper lately…. They’ve gotten a makeover!  Did you know there are over 650 fire hydrants in Sanford/Springvale?

 
The fire hydrants are very important for protecting our community, in fact fire protection is the primary reason a water system was created in our community over 100 years ago.  In August, the Water District Trustee’s, lead by President of the Board Roland Cote, voted to allocate funding to paint the fire hydrants in Sanford and Springvale.  Fortunately, the District’s capital program this year had a small surplus due to projects coming in under budget, so those funds were reallocated to paint hydrants.  

This project accomplishes a couple of things.  First off, the hydrants had not been painted in a while and really were not looking great.  The new paint makes them much more visible, with a helpful aesthetic touch.  Secondly, the color of each hydrant (upper bonnet and caps) actually tells firefighters how much flow they can get from a hydrant.  

The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) color-coding rating system indicates the flow available at each hydrant for fighting fires.  The colors are blue, green, orange and red, with blue being the highest and red being the lowest flow.  Both the elevation in the system and the size of pipe feeding the hydrant are normally the most important factors in determining flow.  Sanford is fortunate to have the vast majority of its hydrant falling into either the blue or green rating.  

All of the work is being completed by District employees.