A water main break last weekend at Animas Surgical Hospital forced the temporary closure of its emergency operations and the cancellation of surgery appointments on Monday.
The water main break Saturday north of the facility flooded a large portion of the facility’s basement and parking garage at 575 Rivergate Lane in Durango.
The break caused a complete loss of water supply, making essential services such as sanitation, patient care and facility operations nonfunctional. Water also seeped into the hospital’s server room causing an internet outage.
Hospital administration elected to temporarily close the facility for safety reasons.
The cause of the break was being investigated. Crews were able to dig up and reach the broken portion of the main on Monday.
The hospital estimates it could be several days before all services are back up and running. Crews are actively working to clean up the site, and staff are notifying patients whose appointments may be affected. The extend of damage was not yet known.
Spokeswoman Karis Morrall said the hospital would likely be closed Tuesday and administration hopes to reopen Wednesday, but nothing will be finalized until the extent of the damage is known.
The water main break forced the hospital to shut off its power.
Because the break occurred on the weekend, few patients were impacted by the flooding on Saturday, hospital administration said in a news release Monday.
However, the water main break displaced about 100 surgical, pain management, radiology and internal medicine patients on Monday, Morrall said.
“We do have an ambulatory surgery center that we were able to move some of the patients over to, especially more urgent ones dealing with fractures,” Morrall said. “We definitely want to take care of them as fast as possible and then we are working to reschedule some patients.”
Other facilities, including Animas Urgent Care, Animas Surgical Center at Escalante, and Southwest Endoscopy Center were unaffected by the water main break. There were also other building tenants who were impacted, but Moral did not have further information regarding the extent of the damage as of Monday afternoon.
“We’re incredibly thankful that the water main break occurred on the weekend,” said Meggin Roberts, CEO of Animas Surgical Hospital in a news release. “Had this happened during our busiest times, the impact on patient care and safety could have been far more severe. We’re grateful that we could act swiftly to protect our patients and staff.”
tbrown@durangoherald.com
