With level-one water restrictions implemented in Gauteng, an Edenvale community member raised concerns about the speed of the City of Ekurhuleni’s response to a water leak.
The leak, in front of 108 Van Riebeeck Avenue, was first noticed by Mohamed Choonara on September 16.
When the NEWS spoke to Choonara on October 15, water was flowing steadily from the burst pipe onto the pavement and down Van Riebeeck Avenue.
Choonara said after he logged a call at the City’s call centre on the 16th, a team soon visited the site and dug a hole around the leak to assess the damage.
He was told that the burst had occurred on the main line.
However, once the hole was dug there, Choonara saw very little action taken by the City.
In addition, water from the leak flooded a portion of the shop Choonara works at.
“When we came to work on September 17, we noticed water in the shop and had to build a barricade to prevent more water from coming into the shop.”
Although no stock was damaged by the water, Choonara highlighted that several display cabinets were damaged by the water.
Curious to find out how much water was leaking from the pipe, Choonara conducted a small experiment.
“We took a 500ml container and in 30 seconds it had filled,” said Choonara.
“We worked out that one litre was leaking per minute. However, this is an estimate as we could not collect all of the water flowing off the pavement.”
Between September 16 and October 15, it is estimated that 41 760 litres of water was wasted.
When the NEWS contacted Choonara on October 18, he said a team from the municipality had visited the site the day before to try remedy the situation.
“They put clamps on the pipe, which stopped the flow of water,” said Choonara.
However, when he arrived at work last Friday the pipes had burst again and part of the store was flooded.
On the same day, he told the NEWS the team from the City were back on site attempting to remedy the new leak.
Choonara believes that the pipes are leaking because they are old.
A request for comment was sent to the City of Ekurhuleni on October 16 at 12.30pm requesting comment by October 18 at noon.
At the time of going to print no comment had been received.
