Could a blocked zone meter be the cause of the lengthy water outage in a section of Glen Marais?
Since the weekend a section of this suburb, bordered by Monument, Dann, Rietfontein and Pretoria roads, had been without water with the metro being unable to pinpoint the problem.
With few and vague messages coming through to the ward councillors, residents remain in the dark. And until now no official statement regarding the situation had been issued.
Ward councillor Gideon van Zyl says has escalated the matter to the highest levels within the municipality without success. No straight answers are being supplied.
As far as Express could establish, there are no visible leaks.
According to a message sent to ward councillor Jaco Terblanche on Tuesday, it seemed ‘we are losing water on the Concourse main line, might be due to invisible burst pipe somewhere but we are on it’.
Van Zyl posted on Facebook on Tuesday morning: “I was informed that the team left the site around midnight last night after they had checked the complete feeder infrastructure looking for faulty or closed valves or signs of subterranean water burst.
“It was also confirmed that an external team is being brought in this morning with specialised leak detection equipment to look for the cause for the extreme low pressure.
“I received an update at 8.50am [Tuesday] from the regional manager, which said: ‘With regard to poor pressure in Glen Marais (Fiskaal, Veld, Consul), the team continues with fault finding. At this point we suspect that the zone meter is blocked on Concourse Street and it is restricting water flow. The team is working on it.”One upset resident, Willie Burger, turned to the Office of the State President for help.
“This is now the fourth day that our complex Coral Cove is without water, not only us, the entire Fiskaal Street. We are paying our taxes but must be comfortable with the incompetence of the municipality. The worst part is that you do not even have the decency to respond to the e-mails send,” an email addressed to the mayor on Monday read.
“Besides having no water, there is also no water available in case of a fire. The municipality did not even bother to provide drinking water to this area. I trust you and your department will get off there backsides today and deliver a service like you are suppose to do.
“Four days without being able to flush toilets, this is a breeding ground for Cholera. I will get the health department to visit the area affected and any illness linked to this situation be invoiced to the municipality. I have gone through the trouble in driving through the area and the entire day no municipal workers were visible to repair any water system,” he wrote.
Johan Kruger wrote to Express: “We keep on hearing they are looking for the problem and this morning (Tuesday) via Facebook we heard they need consultants now. Very pathetic if you ask me. Water pressure in the early hours but from around 5am no water again.”
