Mains works to leave 35,000 in Cork without water overnight

Irish Water repairing section of city’s mains system deemed to be at risk of bursting

Some 35,000 people in Cork city are facing a disruption to water supplies overnight as Irish Water shuts down a supply pipe to carry out essential repair work.

The utility company is sekeing to prevent a repeat of a rupture last week which led to 40,000 users being without supply.

According to Irish Water, it is necessary to shut the water supply for parts of the city supplied from the Cork Lower Reservoir at Shanakiel from 11pm until 7am on Wednesday morning to allow the repair work to be carried out.

It is understood the repair work is being carried out on a different section of pipe to that which ruptured on June 21st but the problem was identified by Irish Water staff when they were seeking to locate that leak which resulted in homes being without water for over six hours.

READ MORE

Jim Fitzgerald, Irish Water’s operations lead for Cork apologised to customers for the disruption but said addressing the poor condition of much of Cork’s aging water network was a key priority for the company.

“We are investing over €15 million to replace more than 27km of water mains in the city and we will continue to invest in the network to bring it up to modern standards, thereby providing a much more secure and reliable water supply for all our customers in the city,” he said.

Among the areas affected by the planned interruption are parts of the city centre, Douglas Road, South Douglas Road, Boreenmanna Road, Blackrock Road, Ballinlough Road, Barrack Street, Bandon Road, Sunday’s Well, Leitrim Street, Gerald Griffin Street, Great William O’Brien Street and surrounding areas in Cork city.

Barry Roche

Barry Roche

Barry Roche is Southern Correspondent of The Irish Times