The City of Cape Town commends the various teams for working around the clock from Saturday. 30 April to 4 May 2022, under extremely complex terrain conditions, to repair a burst pipe in Simon’s Town and restore water supply to affected residents in parts of Simon’s Town, Glencairn and Glencairn Heights. Prompt responses also saw the resulting mudslide on Saturday morning cleaned swiftly so the affected part of the main road could be partially reopened for traffic while repairs were taking place in the shortest timeframe possible.

The City’s Water and Sanitation Directorate teams have successfully repaired the 375mm diameter water main that burst in the early hours of Saturday morning, 30 April 2022,. The team also repaired the secondary leak that was discovered at a coupling joint further up the line when they tested the system on Wednesday morning.

During this time, the City deployed teams to effectively monitor the areas impacted by the water supply disruption and to repair the damaged pipe in the shortest timeframe possible as well as clear the resulting mudslide on the main road.

The section of the road below the damaged pipeline was closed temporarily to allow access for the heavy plant machinery required to do the extensive civil work to stabilise the sloped embankment before the new pipe sections could be installed.

As a result of the extremely complex nature of the work, the Water and Sanitation team had shut off the supply to part of Simon’s Town, but was able to effectively reroute water supply to the Glencairn and Glencairn Heights areas on Saturday evening.

‘This pipe repair was not an easy task to accomplish given the steep and sandy terrain. Our teams had to make use of the excavator to transport the new replacement pipe sections and other heavy equipment uphill, on a sandy incline to ensure the replacement could take place. The teams also used large concrete volumes to settle the newly installed pipeline.

‘Thank you to the Water and Sanitation teams and other City Departments, like Roads, Traffic Services, Corporate Fleet Management, Fire Services and Disaster Risk Management for their collective efforts in attending to this emergency situation.

‘We would also like to thank the residents of the affected areas for their understanding and patience during the repairs and we sincerely regret the inconvenience caused to all residents and motorists during this time. Thank you to the ward councillors as well who also played a key role in assisting the officials and keeping their residents informed of the progress on site.

‘As a caring City, we will continue to maintain and upgrade our water supply infrastructure to benefit our consumers. We also aim to resolve emergency water supply incidents in the shortest timeframe possible when they occur, while ensuring the safety of our staff who have to work under complex conditions. Water service will restore gradually to affected residents as the team clears air bubbles and charges the pipes slowly to limit stress that could cause bursts,’ said Councillor Zahid Badroodien, Mayoral Committee Member for Water and Sanitation.

Source: City Of Cape Town