Bloemfontein Water Crisis
#BloemWaterCrisis: Water supply hopefully restored─── CHRISTAL-LIZE MULLER 08:14 Wed, 22 Nov 2017
Technical teams of the Mangaung Metro managed to assemble and seal a part of the water pipeline that burst on Monday.
Municipal spokesperson, Qondile Khedama, says this was done early this morning at around 02:00 by teams on site. According to him, water is being pumped into the pipeline from the Welbedacht Dam to the main reservoir in Bloemfontein. Water is expected to reach households in the southern parts of the city by midday.
He says water supply to the northern suburbs has been stabilised. Water will still be distributed to the southern parts and affected townships until the full restoration of water supply. This will be done with water tanks and JoJo's. He says the Executive Mayor, Olly Mlamleli, would like to thank residents for their patience during the process.
Council Speaker, Mxolisi Siyonzana, has however condemned opposition councillors for providing counter information to communities during the #BloemWaterCrisis. Siyonzana says the metro's technical teams were on top of the situation.
The metro yesterday afternoon said they worked overnight and managed to extract the damaged concrete pipe and installed a new steel pipe.
Khedama told OFM News on Monday night that engineers fixed a burst pipe last Thursday which resulted in an emergency shutdown affecting mostly the southern parts of the city.
He says once the water reached the Brandkop Reservoir on Monday, it was reported shortly afterwards that the Uitkyk Reservoir’s water levels were drastically going down. They suspected another burst pipe and it was later confirmed.
Khedama says the metro immediately dispatched a team which was working in overdrive to repair the damage and restore water supply to residents.
Repair work was expected to take 24 hours. Water supply to some of the northern suburbs was also affected and the metro said they are "working tirelessly to cover those areas" by distributing JoJo's and water tanks.
Supermarkets, water supply shops and other outlets selling water in Bloemfontein were quickly running out of water supply on Monday night as residents descended in their numbers.
Residents queued patiently to buy drinking water.
On Tuesday some convenient stores in the northern suburbs were low in stock with only a few bottles of water left for sale.
