Broken water line causes landslide, damaging property in Westmoreland County

JoAnn and Samuel Black said they were watching a crew fix their water line on Keystone Street when their yard slid down the hill.

“Down there looking up, it’s horrible. Truckloads! All our dirt is gone,” JoAnn said.

“I was sitting there in that chair seeing what was going on out here, and all of a sudden the tree started shaking,” Samuel said. “I said, ‘What’s going on?’ I thought they were cutting the tree down and didn’t know why, and then I see the tree go down the bottom down here.”

Now, caution tape surrounds their property where a pine tree used to sit. You can still see it resting in the valley of mud below his house. Black’s wife said her next-door neighbor was planting a small orchard on the property.

“He worked over there constantly,” JoAnn said. “It’s like his quiet place, and that bank was perfect on our end, and now it’s a disaster.”

The Blacks said it took crews four attempts to find the water main break on their road before it was fixed. They were told an engineer has to come to take a look at the property before they get any answers.

“I just hope they can get it fixed and it looks good again,” JoAnn said.

The Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County spoke with Channel 11 over the phone. They said an engineer came to assess the land, and although a water line break was being fixed, they still haven’t determined a cause for the slide.

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