Randburg residents are refilling water from provided tankers after days without water. (Belinda Feto/News24)
- Rand Water appears to be trying to figure out why a valve closed while trying to recover from a major power outage at one of Johannesburg's pumping stations about two weeks ago.
- The investigation began when the Bulk Water Supply Company's technical team discovered that water was not flowing into the system, which serves more than 20 suburbs in the Randburg area.
- Eleven days after Rand Water's Eikenhof pumping station was struck by lightning, water is still cut off in parts of Johannesburg.
Rand Water is said to be investigating why valves supplying water to more than 20 suburbs were closed during a power outage that left many residents without water for 11 days.
A meeting between Johannesburg Water, Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda and ward councilors on Tuesday night revealed that a technical team investigating why the Linden 1 and Blairgowrie reservoirs were not filling up found the valves in the “closed position”. It has become clear that there is.
Johannesburg Water said in a statement on Wednesday that Rand Water was investigating and a shut-off valve that had been restricting supply to the system had since been opened.
However, the water company pointed out that the outage was not caused by a closed valve, but was “due to the incident at the Eikenhof pumping station.”
The pumping station, which receives electricity from Johannesburg City Electricity, has stopped pumping three times in recent days.
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The first time was on March 3, when the substation was struck by lightning, cutting off water supply for more than 12 hours.
The pump only has one power source, and City Power said it was in discussions with Rand Water about a second alternative power source. However, the backup cable was not installed because the water pipes were in the way.
Eichenhof supplies water to half of the city, and the power outage affected the system in Soweto, Randburg, Roodepoort and south and central Johannesburg.
Most of those systems have recovered, but Randburg's system only began to recover Tuesday night when the valve was turned on.
On Wednesday, Johannesburg Water and Rand Water teams were reconfiguring the system to increase flow to the Linden 1, Linden 2 and Kensington B reservoirs, Johannesburg Water said in a statement.
“The opening of the valves has helped to build some capacity in the Linden 1 reservoir and tower, and the Linden 2 reservoir, but the Kensington B reservoir and tower and Blairgowrie reservoir are still empty or very low. Our technical team continues to work.'' Johannesburg Water is closely monitoring the above systems and will advise on further action. ”
The company said the valve closure also affected other municipalities in Gauteng and the North West.
