Why Don't Fire Hydrants Freeze and Explode?
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- Опубликовано: 22 авг 2024
- Pipes can freeze in the winter, but you never hear about fire hydrants freezing. What makes them safe from the cold temperatures in winter time?
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I'm glad Hank mentioned UK hydrants because I've seen Americans asking about the 'H's they've seen printed at street corners or on little yellow signs when they are on holiday here or may have seen them in a video. It's so firefighters can find a hydrant, directly next to an H will be a small square manhole cover (or cathole cover considering their size) with the valve beneath it.
@ Rob Fraser: Thanks, i live in America and i never knew that. I just assumed you had fire hydrants like we do.
As a firefighter in the north-eastern United States I can confirm that this is used to attempt to keep them from freezing HOWEVER, it is not always successful. We learn of these methods in our training and everything should work fine but at times the hydrant will fail to drain the water out of the barrel and that water will then freeze, resulting in a hydrant that does not explode (because it is still partially empty and the ice has room to expand) but will not provide us with any water. While this may be classified as just a dysfunctional hydrant, it still does happen at least once a year. On a side note, as crazy as the trash can fact may sound, it is definitely true and we always test the hydrants by flowing water without a hose attached before we attach the hose to prevent any trash from getting into our hose.
Don't ever stop hosting these, Hank. U r the life of this show.
*Sees probably the only thing that could save your house from a fire, uses it as a trash can.* WTF is wrong with people!?!
It's the same reason. Why some people voted for Donald Trump.
dunno if anyone cares but I just hacked my gfs Instagram password by using Instaplekt. Find it on google if you wanna try it
I bring my fire hydrant in for the winter, and only put it back out after the last frost. I also generally trim it back a bit in the spring so it will grow out more bushily.
Another time someone hit a fire hydrant with their car, by my school. The city had to turn the water off on that block to repair the fire hydrant. I didn't have to go to school that day because the school had no water supply.
Im canadian, so I know cold.
I lived in a trailer once and the pipes froze, we had to call a plumber. He had to use a special vacuum to suck all the ice and water out though our toilet.
The only good thing about cold weather in Canada is, if it's -40 out, the city stops running. No buses are running and cars don't start. Which means no school and no work.
When it's that cold out water turns to snow instantly if you throw it.
Jennifer Meikle I live in Edmonton and we don't shut down when it gets cold. People here have block heaters and plug in their cars during deep freezes.
And then there’s Russia
Ducking A man here in calgary if it gets -40 i still have to go to school ffs
In the Northeast, we do indeed have dry barrel fire hydrants. However, they do freeze and burst from time to time. We had one burst in Boston several days ago, water flooded the street for over 6 hours. Generally this only happens if someone forgets to shut the valve off.
I'm sure it happens in other places but all the hydrants I've seen in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Massachusetts are locked up tighter than a witches nipples. So, unless you are in the habit of carrying around a very large wrench to remove the covers, there's no possible way for you to use a fire hydrant as a make shift trash can.
I'm more curious about why dogs are obsessed with them.
Dogs are attracted to them because of chemistry. Fire hydrants have H2O on the inside and K9P on the outside.
Master Therion lmao
More stereotype than reality. Dogs will pee on anything jutting out of the ground.
There has to be a first dog, my dog smells the hydrant if there is another dogs pee on it he will cover it with his own in order to be the owner of that hydrant if not he moves on.
That’s just a myth that cat started to make dogs look stupid
yup, most the hydrants here in Germany are just metal flaps in the ground which you can open with a special tool. The upper part of the hydrant is stored in the fire engine and screwed into the pipe fitting beneath the ground when the water is needed.
What happens if someone parks on top of it, or if it's covered in snow & ice?
Synchronizor if someone parks on top of it the fire department is allowed to push them away by slamming into them and they'll have to pay for the fire engine's bumper if it gets scratched. As for ice, I guess they have plans saying where the access points are and the rest would be brute force, not too sure on that last bit though.
Synchronizor
they are part of local streets and sidewalks and therefore get automatically freed from snow and ice by the owner of the segment by law. besides im pretty sure the firefighters do carry a blowtorch inside their car for emergency situations.
+Tefans97 We have signs that tell how many metres in front of the sign and then to the left/right the hydrant is and how big the hydrant is. Here is an example of a sign for a Hydrant with a diameter of 300mm = 30cm which is located 8.4m in front of + 1.1m to the left of the sign. commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hydrantenschild_Beispielgrafik_2009-01-29.svg
A friend of mine is a firefighter, and when someone parked on top of a firehydrant in a no parking zone, they stabbed the tires on one side of the car and then flipped it on its roof by hand (about 10 hands). It is usually not easy to park on top of a hydrant, because they are usually in no parking areas or in the middle of the street.
That's super cool! How do people use hydrants as trash cans anyway? are they easy to open?
Ikr, if you're going to litter, you might as well just litter instead of taking time to disable an emergency water source. (But seriously don't litter)
They most likely open one of the three ports around the middle that are easy to unscrew if they’re already slightly loose. On a dry hydrant, trash could be dropped into this open cavity. Most of the time, the caps are screwed on tightly and require a wrench 🔧 or specially crafted adaptation called a “hydrant wrench.”
Water comes from wrenching on the very top of the hydrant, called the “operating nut.”
The more you know 🌈
Thanks friend!
Tahsin Loqman I work all over the UK repairing broken hydrants. The metal lids have holes in them about as big as your thumb so that they can be easily lifted. Believe it or not I have found a lot of used heroin needles is rougher areas.
Wow. I never noticed that. I guess I'll take a closer look next time I see a fire hydrant.
I like this video! But I'm kinda confused. Why do you keep plugging the finds if nothing new is there and almost everything is sold out? Maybe just let us know when there's new stuff? Thanks for making such good content!
If you claim that you’re first, that doesn’t make your mother love you any more
Seededfury Yes, “it make you first.”
First
Fist
Or less. :P
Kujyou Hikari No, probably less.
As long as they don't leak and allow water to collect inside the barrel, your video title would be 100% accurate.
@corrxpt Juice I get thousands and thousands of likes on many other comments. No biggie.
even if they leak, they have a drain, the same drain that is used to empty the barrel after it's been used, so if the leak is not bigger than what the hole can drain it won't fill up. that drain hole is closed when you open the valve to use the hydrant, and it's open when the valve is closed....
Oh boy! My girlfriend had me recommend this during the SciShow Brainstorming panel at NerdCon Nerdfighteria! So happy to see it made the cut and became an episode!
In Kentucky where it is colder than usual this year. We had a hydrant explode down the street. Our street became a big slab of ice once it all froze.
Solid layman explanation. Sincerely a firefighter that doesn't like trash in his hydrants.
I just wanted to let you guys know that the advertisement at the end doesn't bother me at all. I don't know why people get so upset about a channel advertising their own product. It's so simple to just exit the video if you've already heard the ad. Maybe people would be more accepting of it if you left off the "why" and just talked about the "where." Either way, it doesn't bother me. Keep up the good work SciShow team!
Yes!!! *Hank Green did the report!!!*
"these old ones" is so much better than "these ones". Thank you for fixing this script.
The video was summed up in the first 30 seconds.
In New Zealand we have the below ground fire hydrants and the red above ground ones are very iconically American to us.
DID ANYBODY THINK THE TITLE SAID “HYDRA”?!
I love GTA..
SirSlayingMiracle it reads hydrant
Get up on the Hydra's back!
Self draining hydrants can lead to groundwater contamination in the water main. Where I live we plug the self draining ports and inspect and pump out the barrels every fall and after the fire department reports to us that they used a hydrant.
mephiskapheles6 Backsiphoning would only be a problem if the pipe is broken or the hydrant itself is leaking, the latter of which would mean that you have water leaking in to the barrel of the hydrant. This can cause an ice plug problem that could keep the hydrant from functioning if it's needed and that is what the weep holes are meant to prevent. Most places just inspect their hydrants to make sure they're working properly instead of tampering with the manufacturer's design.
I should have said they come from the manufacture plugged. Only plugged hydrants are on our approved materials lists. I believe the thinking is that once the barrel drains there is the possibility of ground water seeping back in through the drain holes and cross contaminating the water main.
I've been a sprinklerfitter for 17 years. I've put in quite a few hydrants and I've got blackflow training. It doesn't surprise me that some localities would want the holes plugged, but I think their line of thinking is somewhat flawed. If there is a blackflow situation from the hydrant that means that there's another issue with that hydrant that needs to be addressed other than weep holes. I'd think it would be better to fix those issues when they come up than to risk having a non-functioning hydrant in the event of a fire in the middle of winter.
I don't understand why use them at all as opposed to underground ones given all these problems
I don't think it matters. All styles have piping that comes above the frost line. The underground ones just don't have a barrel that needs to be repaired every time it gets hit by a car. Hydrants are designed to break free if they get hit.
In first grade, it took me ten minutes to climb a hydrant, and I felt like I was sooo high up! Then I went back to the same hydrant in 7th grade, and it looked SO SMALL and I just sat on it 😆(I think I grew like two and a half feet)
What I love about this channel is how they come up with questions I didn't know I wanted answered
I too love the existence of life.
Me too. It's an extraordinary thing to exist.
I always wonder how dumb someone has to be to put garbage in a fire hydrant, garbage and cigarette butts
Well, some people smoke cigarettes while filling their car up with gas. Others don't use condoms. Some people play football. And some vote for Republicans.
In Duluth, MN the city for whatever reason has a fire hydrant in a more rural part of the city that every year grows a giant mountain of ice around it, I’ve seen it grow as tall as 18 feet one year
Funnily enough, I just met a broken hydrant on the way to work today, just before I noticed this video - and yes, it's the European "just a metal flap on the ground" kind. It makes for a nice road river, especially with freezing temperatures :P
I was just thinking (inside my head) about this yesterday.... how did you know RUclips, HOW DID YOU KNOW ?!
Since I can't afford to buy you guys anything I'll just keep liking. Oh ya, comment 300!!!!
In Australia most fire hydrants either are in the ground and using a special tool a piece concrete needs to be lifted up to access it or in a city they’re located in a panel on the side of a building
Yeah, the fire trucks carry the barrel (or whatever we call it here) with them. In country NSW, where I grew up the hydrants were generally a small metal hatch set into the road edge or a concrete pad at ground level.
Australia has fire hydrants? Well there aren't any where I live (rural Australia SA)
Don't most Australians live in parts that never drop below freezing? If so, I guess the preference for low-profile hydrants in Australia has nothing to do with temperature.
Australian trucks (lorries and semi trailers) are much heavier than american trucks. I think the underground hydrants are less likely to be damaged by heavy vehicles.
Lol Bro there would be you just wouldn't see them (provided you are in a town). They are just a metal hatch into the ground in Australia. I'm not sure about in SA but in NSW the blue reflectors in the road mean there's a fire hydrant beside the road there
SciShow Finds: Where everything is sold out except the stuff no one wants: lapel pins (who wears lapel pins anymore???) and socks (no one wants socks on Christmas, unless they're filled with money or chocolate).
But I still love you SciShow. :)
Technically, water contracts when it freezes. But as water cools from 4 deg C to 0 deg C, the liquid expands. As water in a pipe freezes, the ice plug that forms becomes stronger than the pipe material itself, so the pressure generated by the water which is still a little warmer, upon cooling further, exerts the bursting force inside the vessel.
It's so counterintuitive, something with the word "fire" in it will explode, but only when it's cold and filled with water.
Anyone else having an existential crisis?
LOL, kids.
I just am.
Obviously, you've never heard of the infamous water pipe bombs left in freezers.
I left can soda in the freezer and it didn't work so well but I was like 10
Jerel March You can get some pretty fun "super cooled" liquid effects if you calculate your soda freezer times correctly. But be warned, you're going to have a sticky, frozen mess if you leave the can or bottle (try bottles, it's easier to get stuff out) in the fridge too long. And don't do this with glass bottles, for safety reasons.
Scishow I enjoy your videos and your new site. I would really like it if the last 70ish seconds of every video were not about it for much longer. PLEASE (It is more than 1/4s of the video)
If only there were a way to not watch the unwanted portion. Life is so unfair. Damn you, SciShow!
Also it's almost all sold out, so you're just setting people up for disappointment.
Babarudra there is a way. Clicking on a next video/closing the tab/ going into a new tab and muting this one. Or just closing the video on the phone.
Atriya Koller If he only knew that thrre was a way he would never have written that comment. Life is so unfair. Dam you, internet!
No! It can't be THAT simple. People wouldn't be complaining about it if it were that simple.
Neat! Today I learn more about fire hydrants and that the host lives in my state!
Of course the host is in your state. You'll find fire hydrants in all states.
Well thank you for answering a question I never knew I had... 😁
Hank must be the most awesome dad. I mean, imagine having him to help you with school.
Anyone else in the UK and just had a life long question fulfilled?
in my country (belgium) there are NO visible hydrants... but, every house has a connection to the main waterline, and in front of each house the firefighters can use this underground connection to connect a portable hydrant to and use it as they want...
these underground connections in front of each house are capped of by a metal cap to keep the pipe/access clean. And at the bottom of this pipe they have to screw in their mobile hydrant which has a special interlocking cap that opens up the waterline. It's a nice system if you ask me. Ow, and in case you're wondering... no, we don't pay extra if firefighters use water in front of our house to kill our neighbours fire... we have a meter that is located in our house; that is clearly AFTER the hydrant-accesspoint (aka, our accesspoint to the main waterline).
Your shirt is so symmetrical, and it's the best thing ever.
Just say we got merch instead of that chrismas talk thing
Triggered much?
Kevin Jones nah it's just annoying
Saint Simons, Georgia experienced a catastrophic fire after an unusually long and cold freezing spell rendered the hydrants at the scene inoperable.
People shoving stuff down them is one of the reason we flush the hydrant before connecting the hoses. It gets all the dirty water and other stuff out then connect properly.
I live in Flagstaff, AZ. It gets below freezing throughout the winter. I've never seen a fire hydrant left alone in winter. Ours get wrapped in insulation and black plastic. They add a reflective stake near it so if they get covered in snow, they can still be found.
Having no Hydrants over ground gives a huge advantage: you can place them everywhere. In the US it's not good to park in front of a hydrant.
When you doesn't have anything over ground, you can place it on the sidewalk.
Druing a fire, nobody must use the sidewalk when firefighters are working.
Some might ask if this is to complicated or anything else. No. Firefighters have the barrel in their car and a tool to open the hydrant. Some cars have big water tanks that they can use during this time. There are also not that hard to find. In Germany we have sings on house walls or on streetposts that show where the hydrant is.
In few places we have hydrants over ground but most of the time there are not overground.
One upside is that not everyone can manipulate these hydrants.
Fire hydrants are very important they are basically the only social media dogs can use.
You guys are always telling me things I wasn't aware I wanted to know about.
Well explained, everything is correct, I'm a plumber so I know a lot about this subject
I'm busy right now watching sci show my brain is here
I do maintenance on fire hydrants and I work on dry barrel hydrants here in Texas.
Is that so they don't leak when people shoot them?
skyeye21 dry barrel in California. I work water distribution system.
Lilac Lizard no it's so they don't leak when a drunk driver hits them lol
Dry. Like your brisket down here?
RemyRAD yes and no
I actually was a firefighter for a short bit and I actually had to take a course on this
SciShow
Wow, amazing idea with the curating gifts.
Please do this every year, just for the kickbacks & to be pleasant :)
got the commercial ads as soon as you started to talk about xmas... pause... exit... lol
Well as a voluntary firefighter I think it would be better if you explained how the european hydrants work too...you remove the lid, take the hydrant out of the car put it on, than you remove the smaller lid that is like 20 cemtimeters away from the lid where you put the hydrant to, take the large metal rod with square end and use this to open the valve. It is easier to mantain than dry hydrant (+you dont have anything above the groud so it can be ANYWHERE (middle of the road/sidevalk, town square, parking lot...)
Cheers to Montana! Thanks guys! Curious... where abouts? I'm currently in Great Falls. I had no idea that you'd be broadcasting from the great State of. I pictured you elsewhere.... Shows my ablity to stereotype. Any-who, thanks for what you do. (Awesome topic. I work with it daily) Continue to spread all of these bits of knowledge! The only damage is smarter folks!
This is the first time I went... "Where is Montana?" and realized its actually further north than where I live... In Toronto, Ontario, wow... the more you know...
US fire hydrants do seem weird to me. In the UK as you point out, the fire services have access to the water main via a special kind of manhole - they're clearly marked and firefighters carry a key to open them. They need far less maintenance and aren't subject to damage the way you always see in American chase films!
Dry barrel hydrants also work well to prevent water spillage when struck by a vehicle. The top will break off but there will not be a geyser like you see in the movies because the water in below a few meters.
Great news I wish you had more of those tools.. Thanks .
I live in Alaska, and I can confirm that I've never heard of a fire hydrant exploding before.
Alaskan Psyche They have to fund their videos somehow.
I never knew you were from MT! My home state, from billings but hey shout out from Cut Bank! :)
I work at a petsmart grooming salon in Michigan and once the pipes burst so we had no water to wash dogs. I was happy for the time off for a few days but after that I was screwed.
I knew watching this I would find something wrong. In your graphic you show the dry barrel hydrant opening by the valve rising up into the barrel of the hydrant. It actually does the opposite and goes downwards into the elbow, or boot as it is sometimes called. The reason for this is simple, it is a safety feature to keep the hydrant closed if the hydrant is struck by a vehicle and the top is sheared off (which it is meant to do as another safety feature to prevent worse damage)
I might be mistaken, but isnt the main reason for the usage of dry fire hydrants preventing the clogging with ice in case of a fire?
I dont actually think that the freezing of water would make a hydrant explode, since the water will freeze from the top downwards, making the ice-expansion possible in the downwards direction. (top down because of the thermal conductivity with the water supply lines, keeping the deeper part warmer longer, and because the top part has a bigger surface, because the dome on top and the sides are all adding to the cooling down of the water, making freezing from the top down more likely)
They crack when they freeze. I’ve never heard of a hydrant or pipe exploding due to cold weather. We say pipes “burst” when they freeze, but that “bursting” happens slowly and you don’t notice much (except that water doesn’t come out) until the pipe thaws again and water runs out of the new hole(s) in it.
Okay, but listen, we need you to go dig up some more trilobite fossils! I definitely wanted to get one for a friend!
First, GJ putting the Scishow finds link in description this time (though with most stuff sold out, kinda mean now, jus' sayin') \o/
Secondly, while it wasn't clear you were referring to the UK sign above/behind the hydrant as a sign for its location, I feel compelled to point out, the two are unrelated. The sign is there for construction purposes, marking a known height above sea level which construction crews can use to ensure their building is placed at the height it's meant to be built (roughly speaking, it's been nearly 2 decades since I took construction in college and not practised much since).
Is anyone else tired of hear about their "problem" with Christmas? Its only the 5th, and I am sure I will hear them say it every day. This is going to get very very old.
Michael Mittelsteadt It's very boring. Especially the part where they say "People ask us what we want but we don't know what to say. " I don't even know what that has to do with SciShow Finds.
Michael Mittelsteadt the solution is to stop watching the video at that point.
Clearly you haven’t watched as much Rick and Morty as I have
I do stop watching, and its still getting old.
They make 21k a month from patreon, I can't believe they want more.
"Exciting announcement!", and it's neither of those things anymore.
I love the SciShow gifts thing but please don't make a 2 minute video then tack on another 2 minutes of just plugging your site please... It's super frustrating as a regular viewer.
I am here to help you. They'll be no more frustration. You simply go, click. And problem solved. I know that is particularly complicated to do. For someone with limited intelligence like yourself. But fear not. You'll survive.
Thanks for this very interesting and important fact I needed to know, Hank
The fire hydrants in the northern US don't have water in them because it's too cold for fires, so they're best used as trash cans
In the UK the yellow sign says there is a hydrant nearby and how far. I believe they pull up this lid and plug it in.
"What is stuff _for,_ anyway?"
Stuff to put stuff _in._ Stuff to build stuff _with._ 👍
George Carlin used to talk about stuff.
...what happens if you forget to drain a dry barrel hydrant?
Just a note, please adds pictures for each one, (I want to see a wet barrel hydrant)
Hums quietly.. “undah presssha” lol
You guys show do a video about why ceiling fans change directions depending on the season
Scishow finds is awesome!
woah! I would have guessed that because they are different lines, they were salted
so before I watch this, because the valve is actually located 3 to 9 meters under the ground depending where you frost line for winter is, also there is a drain and usually sand or rock at the bottom for the water to drain out of the hydrant before it can freeze after it's use
I've learned as much from sci show myth busters and codyslab (etc) as I did in college XD
1/3 of the show dedicated to advertising your Christmas catalogue. Come on, man.
So turn the channel?
i know what you want hydrants that dont explode so merry christmas i guess
thx for this ha bisky vid i love learning these random facts
uploaded on my birthday
Who.... uses fire hydrants as trash cans?
Simple. People like yourself who ask, that question. Oh lookee there. A fire hydrant. Now I know where to put my trash. Would you also like to know how babies are made?
It's not possible since fire hydrants don't have any openings.
THANK YOU SCISHOW!! But will you PLEASE DO A VIDEO ON GLIOMAS?? Or at least give me a yes or no???
The metal on fire hydrants is already like a inch thick. Good thing out of the insulated it or even heated it? I mean it’s nice that they have a solution but did they try this one?
Y’all should do a video about the frontal lobe/prefrontal cortex
Why bother? Most of those folks that voted for Trump don't have one.
I stayed up all night watching scishow and I have gained 1 IQ.
Thancc.
The holes that the water drains out of them are called weep holes
The whole concept of fire hydrants always confused me because I have literally never seen them. I live in the UK and now I now why.
Where in Montana are you guys, I live here too. It’s hard to find you tubers near here.
Why have them above ground at all? Australia has the same system as the UK, even though very few places get cold enough to freeze - it just makes more sense doesn't it? Nothing to break off or get damaged above ground, or get used as a garbage cab & presumably that access issue you talk of for the dry hydrants isn't an issue either
Think of it this way if a bomb goes off the hydrants won't be blown to smithereens so firefighters can still use them to get whatever blaze is going out.
AnimeShinigami, your saying that in support of the underground or above ground? Because you're making a great case for having them all underground. It's the underground where a nearby explosion just goes straight over them without any impact & where there's no access to anyone wanting to put a bomb inside one.
It would be easier to go into a sewer drain & place a bomb to deliberately blow up a water pipe than to access an underground fire hydrant for that purpose & if a car bomb goes off right on top of, or next to a hydrant, the above ground one is disabled, while the underground one is still completely fine & accessible to the firefighters - as long as they can get to it with the heat of the fire so close to the hydrant
Interesting vid... but why is the second half of it their Christmas list?!?!?
...because it's christmas season
Because Santa knows whether you've been naughty or nice?
I live in Colorado and tonight I realized that a hose was plugged in wich could break pipes, so I unscrewed it and freezing water sprayed at high pressure every where. Why did this happen?
you might want to update the store because most of them are sold out
Yes but what do they do when you get so far north that the ground is always frozen. Up in northern Canada we have heated water lines above ground b/c of perma frost.
I have a question- Why does my body always want to make second poop right when I'm done wiping first poop?