The gushing water that flowed for about 36 hours through the streets of McDonald has been channeled into two gigantic hoses that snake 1,000 feet through the borough to empty into Robinson Run near the municipal building.

The U.S. Office of Surface Mining contracted with Specialized Professional Services Inc. of Washington, Pa., to handle the flow of mine water that was estimated at 4,000 gallons a minute.

That's cleared the streets and given officials some breathing room to figure out a long-term plan for dealing with the runoff.

Although water has been flowing into and out of the old Nickle Plate Mine above the town for years, probably decades, it was coming out the back door, trickling out onto a level area, then flowing down a hill into Robinson Run without anyone much noticing.

On Tuesday, it burst out the front door and into the streets, spewing out of a sidewalk close to an old portal of the mine where miners once would have entered.

The breakout occurred shortly before noon, when workers sent to check the source of water leaking onto Liberty Street dug into the sidewalk.

The reason the flow was so sudden and so ferocious is mostly gravity, said Bruce Leavitt, a consulting hydrologist with West Virginia University who has been studying flooded mines in the Pittsburgh coal basin for about four years. Many abandoned mines gradually, over the years, fill with water from rain and melted snow.

He and Joe Donovan, a professor of geology at WVU, were in McDonald yesterday, slogging around in orange seepage to try to figure out what caused the water to break through.

The mines clustered above McDonald -- Nickle Plate is one of three in the immediate area, and there are several more nearby -- are above stream level. Unlike deep mines, which are entered via vertical shafts, these mines were entered through horizontal or sloping tunnels that followed the path of the coal seams.

McDonald was built at the base of the hill, south of where the mines operated at one time.

"They'd mine from the lowest point and go up from there," said Donovan. And typically, the town would be built near the entryway, so the miners could easily get there.

The coal seam itself slopes up, he said, so the mining would have angled up from the town toward the top of the hill 100 feet above. Any water trying to find its way out would push down toward an old entryway right at the edge of town. Further, the pressure there would be at the point where the rock covering the abandoned mine is thinnest.

Thus, said Leavitt and Donovan, the place where the water broke through is exactly where they'd expect. What's not clear is why it broke through when it did.

It might have been because heavy rains over the fall and winter overwhelmed the current drainage area or areas. It could be that old terra-cotta pipe that was channeling water beneath the surface collapsed. Or one of several points where water could escape might have gotten clogged, building pressure on the other exits.

The first priority was getting the water off the streets, and that was accomplished by late Wednesday night.

"We're using a 12-inch and an 8-inch pump to pump water out," said Mark Slack, assistant general manager of Specialized Professional Services.

"We're pumping it about 1,000 feet down to a tributary of Chartiers Creek, Robinson Run. We're now pumping it faster than it was flowing itself, so we've kept it below street level, which was important for safety of streets of McDonald."

The 14-day contract for around $50,000 could be extended or modified at the end of that time, said Steve Rathbun of the Office of Surface Mining. Officials have estimated it could take from 14 to 27 days to stabilize the flow from the long-abandoned mine.

During that time, the state Department of Environmental Protection, which is responsible for the long-term solution to the problem, can decide what course to take.

"Judging from the maps that we have, we believe the mine is from 750 to 1,300 acres," said DEP spokeswoman Helen Humphreys. "We believe once it does stabilize, there will be a flow of from 0 to 400 gallons a minute.

"The goal is to entirely remove the flow of water from the streets and sidewalks of McDonald. In the next week we will do field reconnaissance and go into the mine and look for other drainage openings," she said.

In the meantime, the agency is working to help residents cope with damage from the water. A steady stream of people came through the borough building yesterday to find out about the subsidence insurance the DEP is offering, arrange for inspections of their property and get more information.

Mayor Jim Frazier said that the borough, which was damaged in the September flooding, will have to find money to repair infrastructure damage to streets and sidewalks caused by the flow.

But the cost of both the temporary diversion of the water and a more long-term solution will be paid by the Office of Surface Mining and the state DEP respectively. He had no estimate yet as to how much the borough will have to pay to repair damage.

The mine water, which is very acidic, will also damage the stream. That flowing on Liberty Street is very clear -- and very dead.

"Robinson Run will be wiped out" by it, said Leavitt.

In other areas, the discharge is orange from iron and other metals.