Miss Livingston lugged these jugs of water up to her fourth-floor apartment at NYCHA's Queensbridge Houses on a frigid Thursday night.

Livingston says she’s had no running water since early in the morning when a water main break erupted near the corner of Vernon Boulevard and 41st Avenue. 

What You Need To Know

  • The FDNY responded to a water main break that erupted near Vernon Boulevard and 41st Avenue at around 3:30am Thursday

  • It affected cars parked in the area, and left some Queensbridge Houses tenants without water

  • NYCHA set up a water station for tenants at the Queensbridge Houses

“It’s beyond frustrating. You go to wash your hands in the sink and you forgot that the water is on I mean off, so I mean it’s terrible. We should not have to live like this,” said Livingston. 

Livingston is trying to stock up on enough water for her family of five, which includes her two young grandchildren. She trekked out into the bitter cold to pick up water from a station NYCHA set up on the grounds for tenants.

“Beyond freezing! And again, we can’t do much with this water. Good thing I have a water cooler and I have fresh water for my kids to drink, but this water is only to flush the toilet so what am I gonna have to come back out at midnight,” she said. 

The water main break was so bad the Fire Department had to help drivers out of their submerged cars. 

NYCHA says the water outage affected some of the Queensbridge Houses due to a valve not holding. The agency says there was no flooding in any of their buildings and no heat was impacted.

Livingston says the conditions are still unacceptable and has this message for the city's public housing authority.

“Could y’all please stop treating the tenants so bad? We pay our rent on time, we don’t deserve to be treated this way. If it was another area, I won’t mention anyone — we would be okay, we would have bottled water outside our doors already,” said Livingston. 

The DEP said the water outage was limited to one building as of Thursday evening. We reached out to NYCHA for further comment on the outage and did not hear back.

A DEP spokesperson told NY1 late Thursday that repairs have been completed and water service has been restored to all customers.