BCM warns of water cut

Residents from Mdantsane, Reeston and coastal rural areas in Buffalo City Metro (BCM) are likely to face a 12-hour water outage today as supply from the Nahoon Dam will be cut off for maintenance work on a raw water line. 

The shutdown will be from 6am to 6pm.

A notice circulated by BCM spokesman Thandy Matebese encouraged residents in these areas to use water sparingly during this period.

But regional manager at Amatola Water, Andre Dyer, yesterday said: “There is likelihood there will be no water . “We do not want to say there will be water then people wake up to dry taps,” said Dyer.

He said the maintenance work was being done by the Department of Water Affairs and involved replacing some valves on the raw water line inside the dam.

Dyer said in an attempt to avoid a cut in water supply to consumers, BCM and Amatola were planing to divert water from the Laing Dam to the Fort Jackson and Potsdam water areas.

“This has never been done before, but should it be successful, there won’t be an interruption,” said Dyer.

Amatola CEO Lefadi Makibinyane said the planned maintenance was routine to avoid breakdowns in the future.