Water service was restored to the town of Victor following a nearly weeklong outage due to a failure in the town’s water main.

After several days of round-the-clock repairs, water was successfully recharged into the system at approximately 6 p.m. May 12, according to City Manager Bobby Tech.

“The repairs are holding,” Tech told The Courier. “We currently have a team of contractors making sure that pressure is equalizing across the system, and that things are working the way they should.”

The system failure happened May 7 when crews replacing the town’s outdated water main dislodged dirt beneath the line and learned that the dirt was actually supporting it.

“During that time, we found another main failure,” Tech said. “Unfortunately, as we were going through this, we realized there are additional failures and those failures began to compound.”

Officials declared an emergency on May 10 and ordered the town’s residents and businesses to cease all water usage, which placed a strain on a town that typically utilizes about 30,000 gallons a day, officials said.

Several neighboring towns and agencies offered their resources and facilities during the outage, including the Aspen Mine Center, Cripple Creek Parks and Recreation Department, the Cripple Creek-Victor School District and the Teller County Sheriff’s Office.

“We appreciate everyone who helped support us through this crisis,” Tech said. “In this day and age, where we see so much division, it is pretty awesome to see a community come together the way this community has.”

Residents were asked on May 14 to run their hot water for a short time earlier in the day to help remove trapped air from the system.

“You may notice sputtering, air, or cloudy water initially as the system continues to normalize,” the request said.

A boil had been in effect until El Paso County tested the water for possible contaminants, and residents were asked to use as little water as possible.

The boil order was finally lifted on the evening of May 14.

“Water is now safe for drinking, cooking, bathing, and all normal use,” the town said in a Facebook post. “We want to sincerely thank our residents, businesses, staff, partner agencies, contractors, and volunteers for their patience, support, and assistance throughout this emergency. This was a challenging event for our community, but the response from so many people helped ensure water service was restored as quickly and safely as possible.

“A special thank you goes to our Public Works crews and emergency partners who worked around the clock over the last several days to restore service and stabilize the system.”

Meanwhile, crews will continue replacing roughly 1 1/2 miles of aging water main.

“The replacement work on the main is moving forward, and we are hoping to have that wrapped up by the beginning of July,” Tech said.