Dwr Cymru has announced that the water mains burst that’s left thousands without water has been fixed. The incident started on Wednesday afternoon at the Bryn Cowlyd Water Treatment Works, Dolgarrog.
This saw water supplies gradually lost across vast areas of Conwy – starting with Conwy Valley and town and later impacting a wider area – including Llandudno, Colwyn Bay, Old Colwyn and Llanfairfechan. More than 40,000 homes were affected and a large number of schools and businesses closed.
It has seen water collection points set up, with those inundated with people needing supplies. The burst water main was two and half metres beneath the riverbed and the volume of water in the river has made the repair exceptionally difficult.
Teams worked around the clock and created a coffer dam to redirect the river and a trench box around the damaged pipe so that could excavate and access the damaged water main whilst protecting their workforce and the environment.
Repair work on a burst water main at Bryn Cowlyd water treatment plant
(Image: Paul Hyde, Cymru Drones)
That repair work has now been done but it could be up to 48 hours before water supplies are fully restored as the network refills. A spokesperson for Dwr Cymru said: “We can confirm that the repair work for the burst water main at our Bryn Cowlyd Water Treatment Works, Dolgarrog was completed at lunchtime. We are now refilling the network.
Bryn-Cowlyd burst repair
(Image: Dwr Cymru)
“Water supplies will still not be fully restored to all affected customers for up 48 hours. This is a high-pressure water main, and we are at a very precarious stage of the process.
“We need to refill the water main and wider water network very carefully to avoid further bursts. The network is nearly 900km long and includes 13 underground storage tanks, with our single biggest storage tank the size of 9 Olympic size swimming pools.
“Different communities within the network area will have their water supply restored at different times, as the network fills again. Discoloured water from your taps is normal after a supply interruption.
“This is usually temporary and disappears once the network settles. We also ask that customers check their taps to ensure that they are closed to help conserve supplies as we refill the network.”