BWA repairs suffer setback

Residents and businesses in the St Michael and Christ Church areas have been forced to contend with shifting timelines from the Barbados Water Authority (BWA), as major repair work at the Belle Pumping Station continues.

Despite hopes that repairs to an aged, cast iron structure would have been completed by Tuesday evening, BWA General Manager Keithroy Halliday could only report that workmen had cleared the first of two phases.

“We’ve completed, essentially, the first phase where we have reseated the two pumps on the new beams that have been installed and we have now moved on to the second phase,” Halliday told Barbados TODAY on Tuesday evening.

“We were hoping that by the end of [Tuesday], certainly, that we would be almost completed, if not completed. But given the delays we encountered, particularly when we had to create the safety platform and the difficulty in removing those beams which we have now replaced, we will be working through the night to push as much as we can with an intention to complete sometime tomorrow morning. That is the best timeline we can give, all things being equal.”

Unlike on Monday, however, the disruptions on Tuesday were widespread and included businesses in the Bridgetown area and hotels on the south coast. According to Halliday, the pumping station was reopened at around 9:30 p.m. to replenish the system after an extended closure, but he warned that the outages could continue across the catchment area in the morning.

“We have had our tankers out in full. We have been responding based on the assignment to different areas, not only to the essential service and hotels, but also to a number of businesses and quite a few residents,” said Halliday.

“That will continue. Responses to all of those areas will take some time simply because we are trying to cater to the demands across the entire catchment area. This is why we have been asking everyone to store water,” he added.

In a statement released on Monday, the acting Minister of Transport, Works and Water Resources Dr Romel Springer maintained that everything was being done to restore water to those currently without it. He reiterated that the platform supporting the pumps was difficult to disassemble because of the extent of the damage, delaying the work by five to six hours.

“We were able to reconnect the pumps to the distribution network and we are expecting to start the removal of two other pumps and the repair of their support structure,” said Minister Springer.
(KS)