Irish Water ‘can’t confirm’ restoration time for Dublin customers impacted by major outage

Tens of thousands of customers, on the north and south side of the city centre, are affected by the outage that has been caused by a burst water main.

The issue arose on Thursday morning and the force of the mains burst at Marrowbow Lane, in the south inner city, was so great, that damage was caused to the roadway.

Usice Éireann and Dublin City Council crews have been working to restore water to affected customers on both sides of the River Liffey today, and the work will continue through the night.

Earlier today, the utility provider said it was expected that some of the repairs will not be completed until 10am tomorrow, but in an update issued this evening, it said it was not possible to give a definitive timeline for full restoration.

Customers in the following areas may be impacted by reduced water pressure or water outages: Dolphins Barn, Harolds Cross, Kilmainham, Fleet Street, Brunswich Street, The Liberties, Gardiner Street, Dorset Street, Drumcondra, Whitehall, Artane, Coolock, Beaumont, Fairview, Raheny, Clontarf, Killester, Home Farm and surrounding areas.

“We can’t yet confirm a time for full return of service to all customers as an assessment of the burst and resulting damage to the pipe will need to be undertaken before a definitive time can be confirmed. Following repairs, it may take several hours for normal water supply to return to all customers due to the size of the network, especially for those on higher ground or at the end of the network. A further update will be provided tomorrow morning,” Uisce Éireann said in a statement.

It has confirmed that water tankers will be in place from 7am until 9pm tomorrow at the following locations: “Northside Shopping Centre, Artane Shopping Centre, Killester Shopping Centre, Griffith Avenue (near Philpsburgh Avenue), Clontarf Coast Road, Clonliffe Road (Croke Park), Newmarket Square off Cork Street, Howth Road, Killester Village, Smithfield, North King St.

Labour South West Inner City Councillor Darragh Moriarty said constituents in the Dolphins Barn and Cork Street areas are “severely impacted”.

“The water is basically trickling at the moment out of the mains. I got a couple of phone calls from people living on Dolphins Barn Street, which is right opposite from the Coombe Hospital, and there’s a local Facebook group in Maryland and there we’re all reporting that the water had either stopped altogether or had reduced to a trickle,” he said.

Cllr Moriarty said there are a lot older people in the affected areas and he urged neighbours to shared whatever water they can spare.

"I know that in Maryland in particular, there would be a lot of older people who might not have access to social media, who might not have even seen that the outage has happened. The messages that are going around on Facebook groups are, check in on your neighbours, see how their fixed and offer any sort of support you can in terms of going down to the shop for them,” he added.

Green Party North Central Councillor Donna Cooney echoed this sentiment and urged residents to notify Dublin City Council via its online alert service if they are affected by the outage.

She said the outage is further proof of the importance of the ongoing work to replace old water pipes across the city.

"They are liable to burst. A lot of people are complaining about the disruption that’s causing in terms of traffic on Alfie Byrne Road… but they’re replacing a 100-year-old water pipe. So hopefully, these things will happen less often when we have these pipes replaced,” she said.

Manager at Centra Bonnington, Drumcondra, Sharon Hutch had to call their supplier for an “emergency delivery” of water, as they have been bringing supplies to vulnerable customers throughout the day.

“We’re not completely out of water, but I’d say we will be,” she said.

"There’s a lot of old people near us that we know would need help, so we ran over with water to them before it’s sold out. There’s some people that can’t even leave their house and we’re bringing water over to them.

"We’re affected too, we have an emergency tank that we run off and we’re near the end of that too.”

The outage has also impacted thousands of other business across the city today, including the Pearse Lyons Distillery, on James Street, which had to close early as a result.

"We’ve had to close our doors today due to a burst water main in the area. Guests with advanced bookings will be offered to reschedule or refunded by our team in the coming days. We do apologise for any inconvenience,” a spokesperson for the distillery wrote in a Twitter post.

Joe O’Reilly of Uisce Éireann said the repairs are being conducted as “quickly and as efficiently as possible to minimise disruption and restore the water supply to homes and businesses”.

"Repairs are complex due to the location of the pipe and the presence of other underground services but crews will continue to work throughout the night until normal water supply has been restored to all customers,” he added.

“We understand the inconvenience an unplanned outage can have and we appreciate your patience as we work to return normal water supply as quickly as possible.”