Pretoria – Residents of Johannesburg and surrounding areas have been urged to use water sparingly as Rand Water began pumping water into reservoirs after repairs to the pipelines.
“Consumers within the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality are requested to be patient and to use water sparingly during this period to allow the systems to recover fully and put water back into the various Rand Water and municipal reservoirs,” said Rand Water spokesperson Justice Mohale.
Rand Water announced on Thursday that its B11 raw water pipeline is now back in service, supplying water to the Vereeniging Water Treatment Works (WTW) following the installation of valve rigs.
“The Vereeniging WTW has restored full supply to Rand water’s Eikenhof pump station which is supplying some municipal customers. Several of Rand Water’s reservoirs are currently very low due to the recent completed maintenance programme and will take time to recover to full capacity.
“The following reservoirs in the Rand Water network are critically low, for example, Rand Water’s Meredale and Forest Hill reservoirs [which are at 0,58m]. These low levels are currently having an impact on several municipal reservoirs within the Johannesburg Water network.” said Mohale.
Full pumping supply to these reservoirs has been restored and Rand Water will provide Johannesburg Water with two-hourly updates on the status of these reservoir levels, until Johannesburg Water is able to start pumping from their Forest Hill tower to supply water to the affected areas.
Earlier this week, the Gauteng Department of Health put hospitals on high alert following the notice of planned water interruptions in the province due to maintenance by Rand Water.
The water interruptions which began on Monday were scheduled to continue until Wednesday.
“Despite no reported water interruptions in health facilities this morning (Monday), the department continues to monitor the situation across its facilities. Gauteng Department of Health together with Joburg Water have put some contingency plans in place to ensure health facilities in the municipal area are not adversely affected by the planned water interruptions that started this morning,” said Gauteng Health spokesperson Kwara Kekana.
She said water tankers and mobile toilets had been deployed by Joburg Water in various health facilities, such as Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital, Bheki Mlangeni District Hospital and Helen Joseph Hospital, among others.
IOL