SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — More than 80 percent of fire hydrants in Tijuana have been vandalized, don’t work or are obsolete, according to Rafael Carrillo Venegas, the city’s fire department director.
He says there are 3,200 hydrants around the city and most need to be replaced or don’t work properly.
“We have not been able to generate a good repair or replacement program for the hydrants,” Carrillo Venegas said, adding that some of the hydrants have been waiting for service for 15 years.
“That’s not our responsibility, we can try to maintain them as a department, but repairs or replacement is the responsibility of the public services department, but they don’t seem to make any progress.”
Carrillo Venegas says hydrants that don’t work or are in bad shape hinder their operations during emergencies.
“Often we come across hydrants that don’t work, now we have to go looking for hydrants in other neighborhoods,” he said. “Consider the time and distance and delays this causes when putting out fires.”
The director said many hydrants are broken by vandals who are looking for precious metals.
“Some contain copper, and once people find out, they extract the metal and start vandalizing other hydrants in the same area, now we have to replace them.”
Carrillo Venegas said another problem is lack of water or low pressure in hydrants something the public services department also needs to address.
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