The Barbados Water Authority today, Tuesday, November 7th, wishes to apologise to its valued customers in some St. George, St. John and St. Philip districts and address the ongoing situation that is currently impacting them.
This issue has resulted from the Bowmanston Pump Station in St John being offline for yet another day. The problem at the facility arose as a result of the inclement weather and to avoid discoloured water being supplied to customers.
Background
This St. John facility is sometimes affected negatively by silt/mud entering the well whenever the area receives heavy rainfall. Once this occurs, the Authority would generally cease pumping to mitigate against discoloured water being pumped into the network. As a result of the inclement weather experienced across the island on Sunday, this action was taken yesterday, Monday. The area generally impacted by the cessation of pumping at this station is wide and causes residents to suffer low-pressure or water outages.
The affected area includes several districts in St. George, St. John & St. Philip such as Drax Hall, Greens, Bath Land, Carters, Cherry Grove, Cheshire, Cliff Cottage, Coach Hill, Codrington, Colleton, Colleton Gardens, Gall Hill, Glebe, Guinea Land, Haynes Hill, Henley, Lemon Arbor, Macaroni Village, Massiah Street, Moncrieff, Moores Land, Mount Pleasant Gardens, Pool Land, Rose Gate, Sargeant Street, Sherbourne, Small Hope, Society Hill, Spooners, Stewart Hill, Todd’s Tenantry, Wakefield Tenantry, Welch Village and surrounding areas.
Ongoing Efforts to Address the Matter
- The BWA is making adjustments to the distribution system to bring water from adjacent systems into the affected areas to reduce some of the districts affected by outages.
- The Authority will make every effort to continue assisting customers in the affected areas via water tanker as a temporary measure once the situation persists.
- Pumping will resume from the facility once the turbidity levels reduce.
Future Plans to Resolve the Discoloured Water Issue
- For the long term, there is a project that will start early next year. This project will rehabilitate the upstream areas of the catchment to reduce the ingress of silt and mud getting into the stream.
- The BWA will also be cleaning and refurbishing the reservoir which was in place from the 1800s.
- We will also be looking at a system to treat any silty water that gets into the stream.
Again, the BWA apologises sincerely for the inconvenience caused to its valued customers in the affected parishes. (ENDS)
November 7th 2023