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Water Shutdown in Johannesburg: Maintenance Efforts Impact Water Supply

Published

10 months ago

July 13, 2023

Johannesburg is halfway through a planned 58-hour water shutdown, resulting in critically low or empty water towers and reservoirs in certain suburbs. To address the situation, Johannesburg Water has increased the deployment of tankers to hospitals and schools while dispatching water trucks to affected neighbourhoods.

The scheduled maintenance shutdown by Rand Water commenced on the night of Tuesday, 11 July. Consequently, residents in certain parts of Johannesburg are currently without water as reported by All Africa.

The shutdown, scheduled to conclude at 5 am on Friday, 14 July, is to facilitate pipe upgrades within Rand Water’s system. The ultimate objective is to enhance the availability and reliability of the water supply.

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The project entails the installation of valves and a section of pipe to establish interconnectivity among the three engine rooms at Rand Water’s Eikenhof pumping station. This pumping station facilitates the distribution of water from Rand Water’s purification plants, which treat water from the Vaal Dam to various water systems and reservoirs across Gauteng.

Additionally, valves will be replaced at the Zwartkopjes pumping station, as well as at the Vereeniging and Zuikerbosch water treatment plants, which process water sourced from the Vaal Dam.

Given the interconnected nature of the water system, several booster pumping stations will be affected, including Daleside, Zwartkopjes, and Eikenhof. Johannesburg Water has advised that customers residing in higher-lying areas may experience a longer outage as the network gradually recovers.

The municipality and water authorities are actively working to minimise the shutdown’s impact and ensure the water supply restoration as soon as possible. Updates will be provided as the maintenance efforts progress.