Loss of supply - South Hampshire

Bottled water station	Location	Live Status
Cantell School	Violet Road, Southampton, SO16 3GJ	CLOSED
South Winchester Park & Ride	Winchester, SO21 2FG	CLOSED
IBM Hursley	Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN	CLOSED

 

UPDATE 18:25 19 February

We're extremely sorry to customers, businesses and other organisations in Eastleigh, Southampton and Winchester for the disruption to your water supply this week.
 
We fully appreciate the distress and disruption it’s caused, and we want to reassure you we're doing everything we can to make sure this doesn’t happen again. If you lost your water supply, you’ll receive a letter or email in the coming weeks about compensation.

For more details on compensation, visit: Guaranteed standards of service (southernwater.co.uk)

 

UPDATE 14:50 19 February 

We are pleased to say the final water quality samples were all clear through the night. Our Otterbourne site is now returning to full production.

 The majority of our customers should now have their water back. If you don’t have water, please call us on 0330 303 0368.

We will be updating our customers about compensation payments in the coming weeks. Payments, which will be credited directly to customer water accounts, will be based on the Ofwat Guaranteed Standards Scheme, a scheme that we support.

 As a precaution, our bottled water site at IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN will remain open until 4pm.

As water returns, you may still have low pressure – this is normal and is only temporary. You can also expect to see bubbles and discolouration. More information about what you can expect is available here.

 

UPDATE 11:33 19 February 

Most homes in Winchester, Southampton and Eastleigh should now see their water supply returning to normal this morning.  

 It may take time to reach your taps, and when it does, you may notice low pressure and some discolouration, which is completely normal and temporary.  More information about what you can expect is available here.

The bottled water stations at Cantell School and South Winchester Park and Ride are both extremely quiet and will close at 1pm. IBM will remain open this afternoon.

 We’re so sorry again for the disruption and distress this has caused over the last few days.  

 

UPDATE 07:07 19 February 

All expectations are that your water supplies will return to normal service this morning. The final water quality samples were all clear through the night. Our Otterbourne site is now returning to full production.

We would like to thank our customers for their ongoing patience and recognised the inconvenience and distress this situation has caused.

Our bottled water sites open at 8am at the following locations:

• IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG

Deliveries of bottled water to customers on our priority service register will also continue.

As water returns, you may still have low pressure – this is normal and is only temporary. You can also expect to see bubbles and discolouration. More information about what you can expect is available here.

UPDATE 20:00 18 February 

We’ll continue to work through the night to get our Otterbourne site back up. As soon as the final water quality samples are received we’ll get water flowing so that you should be back in supply for the morning.

 As a precaution, our bottled water sites will re-open tomorrow at 8am at the following locations:

• IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG

Again, as a precaution, deliveries of bottled water will also continue

As your water returns here’s what you can expect:

 Discoloured water from your taps is normal after a supply interruption. This is usually temporary and disappears once the network settles. 

• If the water is cloudy and white, try leaving it in a glass for a few minutes to see if it clears, this will be air trapped in the water as the pipes refilled. 
• Chlorine smell or taste. This is perfectly normal and comes from the small amounts of chlorine that remain in your supply known as 'chlorine residual'.
• If the water has a brown or black colour, run your tap for a few minutes and it should clear. If this doesn't work, turn the tap off, wait 20 minutes and try again. It’s fine to use your water as normal when your water runs clear.  
• Sometimes after a network has been emptied air locks can occur either in our pipes or customers’ – running taps for a short while can help bring water through. 
• It’s not unusual to see an increased number of external leaks after an incident like this, so if you should see something, please let us know -  Report a leak in a public place (southernwater.co.uk)

 When you go to bed tonight, or leave the house, please make sure that taps are switched off so that when water returns you don’t experience an accidental flood.

 Thank you for your patience, we’re sorry for the impact this incident as had.

UPDATE 16:50 18 February 

Our bottled water stations are very quiet so if you’d still like to collect water today they’ll be open until:

 

• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ – closes 6pm
• IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN – closes 6pm
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG – closes 8pm

 

Bottled water stations will open again tomorrow at 8am. We’re planning this as precaution. providing we get the expected water quality results late tonight we’ll be starting the process to re-pressurise and by the morning you should be back in supply.

UPDATE 15:50 18 February 

While we know that we still have 3,500 customers still without water, we’ve made good progress today with our plans to get everyone’s water supply returned.  As soon as we get the results from the final water quality tests we’ll be able to recharge the network and get your taps flowing. Final results are expected very late tonight which means that we’ll be starting the process to repressurise overnight and by the morning you should be back in supply. 

If you want to collect more water we know that our bottled water stations are quite quiet at the moment. You can find them at:  

• IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG  

Even with water returned to normal tomorrow we will ensure that bottled water remains available. We always do this as a precaution until we are totally confident that the incident is over. 

For our customers on our Priority Services Register we are continuing to make deliveries.  If you need help, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

if you need to be added to our list of emergency deliveries - call us on 0330 303 0368.  

We know that many of our customers are asking about compensation and we’ll be writing to you in the next few weeks. Payments, which will be credited directly to customer water accounts, will be based on the Ofwat Guaranteed Standards Scheme, a scheme that we support. 

We know that this is frustrating, particularly for those customers that we haven’t been able to rezone. We’re really sorry and are working hard to restore your water. 

 

UPDATE 14:40 18 February 

We know that our customers have questions about what’s caused the incident at our Otterbourne water supply site. We’re committed to working openly and transparently, here’s a little more information. 

Our water supply works and our wastewater treatment works operate on totally different systems and their networks are separate.  

During routine maintenance on our water site, while we were refurbishing a filter some ‘special washed sand’ made its way into the next section of the water supply process.  While ‘special washed sand’ might sound strange, it’s an industry approved product and used as standard by many other water companies. At no time did the filters become contaminated, and in fact they are not vulnerable to contamination. They are used to filter small particles from the water prior to disinfection. 

As the system is designed to do, our monitors detected what had happened and immediately shut down the site. The unfiltered water and small amount of filter media were contained well before it got anywhere close to customer supply.  

We've now safely drained the water and cleaned the affected part of the process before we started to refill the system yesterday. We are now focussed on water quality testing before we bring Otterbourne back online. We operate to the very highest legal and regulatory water quality standards so this is taking some time and we know it’s going to be late tonight before we will get the results back that we need.   

We know that we have a responsibility to provide our customers with a safe, reliable supply of water. It’s a responsibility that we take very seriously. We have many systems and stringent quality tests to ensure water quality. We also have varying levels of resilience across our network to help us to ensure a reliable supply, however sometimes  supplies can be interrupted. When this happens we work night and day to bring customers back into supply as quickly as possible.  

Rezoning our customers from one part of the network is just one of the activities that we can take if there is a problem on the network. For this incident we have been able to limit the number of customers impacted from c. 20,000 to around 3,500. We have also been using a fleet of water tankers to inject water straight into the network to increase pressure and provide supply. In addition, we are already in the middle of a £22m investment programme to improve our resilience at Otterbourne.  

The incident at Christmas was caused by a combination of factors and is totally unrelated.  Leaks and burst pipes caused by the freezing weather followed by a rapid thaw as temperatures rose quickly meant that demand for water was outstripping the ability of our water treatment sites to supply.  We had to make the difficult decision that in order to protect critical infrastructure like hospitals, we had to restrict water supply to some of our customers.  

We know that our customers are frustrated that their water supply has been interrupted twice in two months. We are so sorry and we’re working to get you back into supply as quickly as possible. 

UPDATE 09:40 18 February

We’ve had a burst on our water main in Winchester Road, Southampton. A team has isolated the burst and put a rezone in place.

Water pressure is returning, however because of the wider issues at Otterbourne, customers will see intermittent water supply throughout the day. 

Bottled water sites are open at: 

• IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG  

We’re so sorry for the added inconvenience this burst will cause.  

 

UPDATE 07:50 18 February

Work continued overnight and the system has been cleaned, disinfected and refilled. We are now focussed on water quality testing. We operate to the very highest legal and regulatory water quality standards so this is going to take time. We expect to be able to operate our Otterbourne site normally by late this evening at which point customers can expect to see their water and water pressure return. 

For those customers who had low pressure yesterday, it’s likely you will continue to experience intermittent supply, particularly at peak times such as first thing in the morning. This is to be expected until Otterbourne returns to full operations. 

Bottled water sites are open from 8am at the following locations: 

• NEW - IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG  

Deliveries of bottled water will continue; we are prioritising areas of the region where we know customers still have no supply. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

We’re so sorry for the time it’s taking to restore water to all customers and the ongoing frustration this is causing. 

 

UPDATE 18:30 17 February 

We’ll be working through the night to get our Otterbourne site back up. We’ll share an update in the morning about how our plans have gone, and we expect to have the site running by late tomorrow. 

We’re continuing to look at how we can get our remaining customers who currently have no water rezoned. If successful, this would mean that they have some supply during the day tomorrow, even if intermittent. Our teams will continue working on this overnight and we’re using our water tanker fleet to support us and put water into the network wherever we can to restore pressure. 

 Our bottled water stations are still open, they’ll be closing at: 

• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL - closes 7.30pm
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ - closes 8.00pm 
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG - closes 8.00pm 

Bottled water sites will re-open tomorrow at 8am at the following locations: 

• NEW - IBM Hursley, Hursley Park Rd, Winchester, SO21 2JN 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG  

Deliveries of bottled water will continue, we are prioritising areas of the region where we know they still have no supply. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

We’re so sorry for the time it’s taking to restore your water and the ongoing frustration this is causing. 

UPDATE 14:40 17 February

Work to get our Otterbourne water supply works back up and running is progressing as planned. We continue to have confidence that the 3,500 customers that are still without water will have their supply returned tomorrow. We’re really sorry for the ongoing distress and inconvenience this is causing. 

For those customers who have had their water rezoned, your supply will continue to be intermittent, particularly at peak times, until our Otterbourne site is back in service.  

If you’re leaving the house this evening and your water’s not back before you leave, please make sure your taps are turned off in case it returns while you’re out to avoid accidental flooding.  

Bottled water stations remain open at the following locations: 

• South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL  

We’ll share closing times later this evening, and if you want to collect more water we know that they are quite quiet at the moment.  

Working with our local communities we have also been delivering pallets of water to a number of village halls and community centres. Information for these locations is being shared across local community channels and social media to avoid them becoming overwhelmed. 

Deliveries of bottled water will continue throughout the day to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

 

UPDATE 08:20 17 February

Our ongoing rezoning work has gone well and more customers are waking up to water supply. This will continue to be intermittent at peak times however please don’t worry, this will return as the network refills. If you leave your house during the day, please ensure that all taps are switched off to avoid accidental flooding. 

We still have 3,500 customers without water and we’re really sorry for the ongoing distress and inconvenience this is causing.  

Work at our Otterbourne water supply works has continued and the work to drain, clean and disinfect the treatment process affected is now complete.  The next stage is to undertake extensive water quality testing before we allow water back into main supply. There are stringent quality standards that we must maintain and that is why this will take time.  If everything goes to plan, we expect the network to be stabilised and quality tested tomorrow.  

Bottled water stations are open from 8am at the following locations: 

• NEW - South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG 
• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ  
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL  

Deliveries of bottled water will continue throughout the day to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.   

We’ll keep you updated throughout the day, please check back here for further updates. 

Our teams are working really hard to return your water supply to normal, we’re really sorry for the ongoing inconvenience this is causing. 

UPDATE 20:30 16 February

Our bottled water stations are now all closed for the day. We’ll be open again tomorrow at 08.00 at the following locations:

• Cantell School, Violet Road, Southampton SO16 3GJ
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL
• NEW - South Winchester Park and Ride, SO21 2FG

We are hoping that most customers will see some supply return overnight, however this is likely to be intermittent throughout the day, particularly first thing in the morning when there is a lot of demand. Please ensure that your taps are switched off overnight to avoid flooding in case your water returns.

Deliveries of bottled water are continuing to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

Please check the website regularly for further updates about how our plans are progressing.

We’re really sorry about the ongoing distress. We’ll be working through the night to return things to normal as quickly as possible.

 

UPDATE 18:55 16 February

Our work to return water supplies is progressing well. Many of our customers are rezoned, and if our ongoing rezone plans proceed as we hope overnight, it’s possible that by the morning almost all customers will have some intermittent supply.

As we continue our work to bring Otterbourne water supply works back online, it is likely that customers will see their water supply drop in and out as demand across the network varies.  This is normal.  We’ll keep you updated when this phase of our work is complete and you can expect to see the situation stabilise.

Bottled water stations

Our bottled water stations are open, and will be closing as follows

• The Ageas Bowl (through the North Entrance from Botley Road) SO30 3RS – Closes 7.30pm
• Cantell School, Violet Road Southampton SO16 3GJ – Closes 8.30pm
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL – Closes 8.30pm

We’ll have bottled water stations open again in the morning, and we’ll place updates here to confirm timings and locations.

Deliveries of bottled water are continuing to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.  

If you are seeing your water return, here’s what to expect - My water looks unusual (southernwater.co.uk)

We’re sorry for the inconvenience and we’re working hard to restore services.

 

UPDATE 15:05 16 February 

Our teams have been working hard to get water supplies back as quickly as possible. We have managed to rezone many of our customers – basically change the part of the network where your water comes from – so that by this evening we hope to have reduced the number of households impacted by more than half, to around 7,000. 

For those that are unfortunately still out of supply, we wanted to explain what’s happened.  

During planned maintenance at our Otterbourne water supply works, our systems detected that untreated water was not being filtered correctly. Our systems are designed to automatically shut down to avoid their being any risk to our water supplies should this situation arise. 

Work has been underway since yesterday evening to safely contain, drain, clean, disinfect and refill the part of the system affected.  Once the system is refilled, we will undertake extensive water quality testing before putting water back into supply. 

We would never take risks on the quality of the water that we provide and it’s important that we carry out this process in the correct way. This is why it’s taking time.  

Our bottled water stations remain open into this evening and you can collect water from:  

• Cantell School, Violet Road Southampton SO16 3GJ.  
• The Ageas Bowl (through the North Entrance from Botley Road) SO30 3RS 
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL. 

Deliveries of bottled water are continuing to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.   

If you are seeing your water return, here’s what to expect. 

 We’re sorry for the inconvenience and we’re working hard to restore services. 

UPDATE 12:20 16 February 

 Our third bottled water station will be open at 12:30pm. Here are all three locations you can collect water from: 

• from 12:30pm, Cantell School, Violet Road Southampton SO16 3GJ.   

• The Ageas Bowl (through the North Entrance from Botley Road) SO30 3RS
• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL

Sites may be busy, so please be safe and allow extra time to pick up your water.  

UPDATE 10:40 16 February 

We now have a second bottled water station open and you can collect water from: 

• Places Leisure in Eastleigh, SO50 9NL   
• The Ageas Bowl (through the North Entrance from Botley Road), SO30 3RS  

Sites may be busy, so please be careful when you collect bottled water. 

If you need access to bottled water as a priority, you can sign up to our Priority Services Register and we’ll add you to the list of emergency deliveries call us on 0330 303 0368  

We’re sorry for the inconvenience and disruption caused.  

If you need access to bottled water as a priority, you can sign up to our Priority Services Register and we’ll add you to the list of emergency deliveries call us on 0330 303 0368  

UPDAE 07:45 16 February

A bottled water station will open at The Ageas Bowl at 8am. Please use the North Entrance from Botley Road, SO30 3RS. We’ll be opening more sites this morning, and we’ll confirm locations as soon as we can. 

 If you require access to bottled water as a priority, you can sign up to our Priority Services Register and we’ll add you to the list of emergency deliveries. Please call us on 0330 303 0368.   

 We’re sorry for the inconvenience and disruption caused.  

UPDATE 06:30AM 16 February

We’re really sorry that our customers in South Winchester and Southampton are waking up to low pressure and a loss of water supply. 

 Our teams worked through the night to resolve the issue, however it could take us 48 hours to return services. 

 Bottled water stations will be open this morning and we’ll be updating the website shortly with locations. 

 Deliveries of bottled water will continue to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.   

 Please check back regularly for updates

UPDATE 21:30 15 February

We’re sorry that due to a failure at our Otterbourne water supply works, customers in the south Winchester and Southampton area are experiencing no water or low water pressure. 

We’ll have bottled water stations open in the morning and we’ll provide locations here as soon as confirmed.  

We’re delivering bottled water to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register. If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.   

 

Due to a failure at our Otterbourne water supply works, customers in the south Winchester and Southampton area are experiencing no water or low water pressure. 

We’re sorry for the distress and disruption this is causing. We are doing everything we can to reduce the number of customers who are impacted and to get those without water back into supply quickly. Unfortunately, it’s likely that if you are currently without water, this will continue until at least the weekend.  

We’ve started deliveries of bottled water to our most vulnerable customers on our priority services register.  We are also setting up bottled water stations in the area and will announce the locations of these as soon as we can. 

If you have any concerns, call us on 0330 303 0368.