Team Herald

MAPUSA: A main water pipeline was damaged near the petrol pump at Duler, Mapusa on Wednesday afternoon causing wastage of over thousand litres of water. The water accumulated on the road causing severe traffic jams and inconvenience to the commuters throughout the day.

This pipeline supplying water to the seven constituencies of Bardez from the Assonora Water Treatment plant ruptured around 3 pm. Areas that were affected were Tivim, Siolim, Mapusa, Saligao, Aldona, Calangute and parts of Porvorim.

On being informed about the problem the PWD officials rushed to the site and shut the supply of water from the plant at Assonora. The repair work was taken up throughout the night and the damage was rectified. 

Finally after carrying out testing from 1 pm onwards on Thursday the water supply was restored on the festival of Ganesh Chaturthi at 4 p.m.

A local went on to lament that on the festival day they didn’t have water. 

“On Wednesday and Thursday we did not get water supply because this pipeline was damaged. The PWD, WRD and Fire Service Department worked together tirelessly to handle this mishap,” said Shekhar Naik.

A fire official made known that they reached the spot at midnight 12 am to clear a tree that was causing problem in undertaking the repair works. “In order to fix this ruptured pipe a tree and its roots deep beneath had to be cleared. It was a little difficult to cut the tree as there was a house on one side and a 11 KV electricity line on the other side. It took us four hours to undertake this task,” said the official from the Mapusa Fire Department.