Schools and homes evacuated after Thames Water pipe bursts

Times

4 days ago

A burst water main in south London forced a primary school to close, caused 27 homes to be evacuated and left 12 postcodes with low or no mains pressure on Tuesday morning.
Videos of the worst affected area in south Bermondsey showed water halfway up the wheels of parked cars and semi-submerging the playground of Ilderton primary school, which closed for the day.
Water also made its way into the car park of the Den — the Millwall FC stadium — and into the food bank storage room of a near by church.
The day care centre next door advised children to arrive in their wellies, and residents were told to avoid contact with the floodwater and wash their hands regularly.
Ash, a resident, told the BBC: 'The water came all the way down the road, from the bridge all the way down to the train station. I've only ever seen this in a tsunami or a hurricane-like situation.'
Another resident, Lauren, said: 'It was quite scary really because we didn't know how high it was going to come up. I'm just so grateful that the house isn't damaged.'
The flood happened on the same day that Thames Water released its latest financial accounts, revealing a £1.65 billion loss.
Sir Adrian Montague, the company's chairman, today also told MPs on the environment, food and rural affairs committee that Thames Water was still in 'crisis mode'.
'What we are here to do now is to help it avoid a special administration,' he said. 'It will take at least a decade to turn Thames around,' added Chris Weston, the water company's chief executive.
The flood started in the early hours of Tuesday morning, with the London Fire Brigade and Met Police arriving soon after.
Southwark council said its staff had set up a rest centre to help those who had to leave their homes due to the flooding.
Thames Water had sent a message to customers in the morning that said: 'Sorry that water may not be flowing properly. We're aware of a problem and we're in the area investigating. We'll get things back to normal as quickly as possible.'
The flooding subsided by early afternoon as the supplier isolated the broken pipe section but the leak left debris behind and residents were still advised to avoid local roads.
The council and emergency services continued to manage traffic, repair damage to roads and distribute water and sandbags into the afternoon.
Miatta Fahnbulleh, MP for Peckham and minister for energy consumers, thanked those involved in the quick response online.
• Water industry is 'deaf' to crisis facing sector, warn MPs
On Tuesday afternoon Thames Water said: 'Our teams are onsite and have isolated the section of pipe that needs repairing. Water pressure continues returning to the area and customers should be seeing their supply come back. Your pressure may be lower than normal at first, but it will recover over the remainder of the day.'
The water supplier, the UK's largest, with 16 million customers, also experienced a sharp increase in pollution incidents during the past year.