Water pressure ‘improved’ in Wiltshire homes after burst pipe

Pressure is “improving” in an area which has been without water for more than a day due to a burst pipe, Thames Water said.

Residents in Royal Wootton Bassett, Thornhill and the surrounding Wiltshire villages of Bradenstoke and Lyneham began experiencing problems with their water supply on Tuesday morning.

On Wednesday, the company opened a station to distribute bottled water and delivered supplies to customers.

Thames Water apologized and said engineers were working to fix the problem.

The company added that pressure may drop again during peak demand between 17:00 and 19:00 BST.

“In the meantime, to reduce the impact on customers, we are using tankers to pump water into the water network,” a spokesman said.

“We are very sorry for our customers in Royal Wootton Bassett and Thornhill who are experiencing low pressure or no water.

“Our engineers responded and successfully repaired a broken mains water pipe this morning and are now flushing the pipe to get it back up and running.”

Customers in need of bottled water can collect free supplies from the Tesco Superstore on Beversbrook Lane in Calne until 9pm.

Residents reported not having running water for more than 30 hours.

Gary Lloyd, 69, who lives in the Bungalow Park retirement community in Bradenstoke, said all his neighbors had no running water.

He said: “Most of the people who live in the village are very mature people and you had to go out and get water for people or share water with your neighbors because clearly there is no water station within walking distance.”

“It’s overdue,” he told BBC Radio Wiltshire.

He added that people flushed their toilets with water from the garden and could not do laundry.

He described Thames Water’s response as “fragmented” and “disjointed”, adding that, given the scale of the disruption, “one would have thought the operation would have a bit more ‘oomph'”.

Thames Water said that while the infrastructure is washed out and brought back into service, it is “bringing water into the area through other parts of the network to improve the situation” and using tankers to pump water into the water network.

“Should customers require further assistance, we encourage them to call us on 0800 316 9800. We have also sent text messages to affected residents and continue to post the latest updates on our website.”