CALGARY — Residents in Calgary were directed Thursday not to take showers or baths and some were told to boil their water as the city grappled with a major water main break.

“We’re asking you to make temporary sacrifices,” Sue Henry, the head of Calgary’s emergency management agency, said at a news conference.

The city of about 1.6 million people issued the warning just before the morning commute due to the water main break in the city’s northwest, where water flooded streets and snarled traffic.