Joburg Water warns residents that full supply may take time

Johannesburg Water has warned residents that the full recovery of supply will take a while following Rand Water’s maintenance shutdown.

Rand Water concluded its three-day maintenance shutdown on Friday, but some areas were still not fully restored.

The planned shutdown affected more than 220 suburbs forcing residents to panic buy and store water for the outage in scenes similar to those of the Covid lockdown.

Recovery

Johannesburg Water spokesperson Nombuso Shabalala said as more Johannesburg Water systems recover, more areas are gradually starting to recover again.

“Some customers in the Randburg/Roodepoort suburbs had by Friday afternoon, 14 July, reported that water had started returning to their taps, specifically in Sundowner, Allen’s Neck, and Randpark Ridge.

“However, most of the region’s supply is still critically low to empty. To mitigate the situation, supplementary tankers have been redirected from the Midrand region to assist in the Randburg/Roodepoort areas.” Shabalala said.

Earlier on Friday morning, residents in Rosebank, Dunkeld West, Oakdene, Kenilworth, and parts of Soweto had already started getting water in their taps.

ALSO READ: It’s over − Rand Water completes 58-hour maintenance

Water systems

Shabalala said the Johannesburg South and CBD areas continue to show slow recovery.

“Additional tankers have been deployed to the Johannesburg CBD areas to mitigate the low supply.

“Customers are reminded that although the Johannesburg Water systems are showing gradual improvement, it will take time before reservoirs and towers fill up again,” she said.

Load shedding

Meanwhile, South African’s will have to contend with another with saga after Eskom announced stage 6 load shedding for the entire weekend.

The parastatal said the higher stages of the deliberate power cuts was due to the cold weather and increase in electricity demand and in order to replenish emergency reserves.

Interim spokesperson Daphne Mokwena said the higher stages of load shedding could set a possible path for the reduction in the deliberate power cuts for the coming week.

ALSO READ: Eskom imposes stage 6 load shedding for entire weekend due to cold weather