A water-supply maintenance project by the City of Cape Town’s Water and Sanitation Department that was planned for Thursday (2 November) proved a challenging exercise that resulted in fault after fault and left residents of Ward 100 in Gordon’s Bay without water for up to 72 hours.
Dozens of residents aggressively lambasted the apparent inability of the City to restore water supply within the time frame, which initially was supposed to take place only between 08:00 and 18:00, but the water returned only during the early hours of Sunday morning (5 November).
The initial challenge, reported by Councillor Sean Stacey early on Friday morning, was that water started coming through (the network), but as pressure built up a problem occurred at the construction site where the coupling had moved.
“The contractor will have to come back and repair it, and water will have to be switched off again. Arrangements will be made for tankers.”
This was followed by further explanations later the day that contractors encountered blockages when they turned their systems on and afterwards added more bypass pipes to supplement the supply.
“I am in contact with the officials, however they can’t keep giving me updates every few minutes,” Stacey told residents after being inundated with demands for answers on progress being made.
“The situation is fluid and complex, and often there isn’t any news every 30 minutes.
“Furthermore, my bombarding the contractors with requests for information also hinders them from getting their tasks done. I hope everyone understands and I’m hoping things get sorted soon.”
Hours later it was noted the water from the two bypass pipelines were not sufficient to supply the area and contractors had to breach adjacent zones to boost the water supply to the area and monitor the progress to avoid pipe bursts.
Late on Friday night, when water supply was still not restored, Mayoral Committee member for Water and Sanitation Zahid Badroodien sent a message to residents explaining that the demand for water was higher than anticipated despite the introduction of an alternative flow. This means there will be low pressures at peak hours as the temporary supply line is smaller than the existing pipes.
“This goes to say that the pressure will be very weak, but we anticipate it will improve overnight,” he said. “Tomorrow morning we intend to lay another pipe to boost the pressure. There are tankers that are roaming through the area.”
On Saturday morning, another challenge was presented as Badroodien revealed that teams arrived on site to discover the additional water connection made the day before had come loose.
“The contractor is currently on site repairing the connection,” he said.
“We anticipate that once this is complete pressure will slowly build up again. This in addition to the work of laying an additional pipe this morning.”
Badroodien added the situation was not anticipated and everything was being done to attend to the problem as quickly as possible.
Later on Saturday residents were notified that teams were excavating to expose the identified connection points for the Strand 100 mm additional connection, and this tie-in should further assist in providing adequate water supply to the Dobson area of Gordon’s Bay.
It was later stated a decision was taken to abandon the project until further notice and to reinstate the pipeline.
“Once again, the inconvenience is regretted. My sincere apologies to all the residents,” Badroodien said.
Water supply was eventually restored during the early hours of Sunday morning.
While many residents took to Facebook and WhatsApp groups to bemoan the long water interruption, others came to the City’s defence and insisted that communication was adequate in extraordinary circumstances.
The City is yet to determine a new date for the maintenance project which remains incomplete.
