Water, water everywhere

Barbadians continue to appeal to the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) to make haste and repair some broken pipes that are spilling precious water down the drain.A peeved NATION reader stated last Thursday that a burst main in Bishop’s Court Hill, Collymore Rock, St Michael, which appeared to be under the road, had been overlooked for a number of years.The “concerned resident” statedin an email: “This pipeon Bishop’s Court Hill, right behind the soft stone wall where the British American Insurance new building is on the hill,has been runningfor a number of years.“The road was repaved in recent time and yet the pipe has not been fixed. It is leaking from where the gutter ends off. We in Brittons Hill have been suffering water outages for years, bathing from buckets on mornings, and yet this precious commodity is being wasted there.”Another burst was discovered in Kew Road, Bank Hall, late last week.A resident told the DAILY NATION that the week before, he thought the water in the road was coming from “the boys washing cars”. However, he realised that dayslater, the water was still running.It was not all bad news though as far as water repairs were concerned last week. A BWA crew turned up at 10:30 a.m. last Wednesday to fix a burst just outside Nation House, Fontabelle, St Michael, that was reported around 7:30 a.m. Within an hour, the work had been completed.However, concern remains over the amount of water wasted from unfixed pipes.Back in 2007, then acting BWA general manager Dr John Mwansa had said more than 12 million gallons of water per day were being wasted due to burst mains.However, when contacted over the weekend for an update, Mwansa said he would have to be given the authorisation to speakto the Press concerning such matters. (BW)• Over the past few months Barbados has been experiencinga drought. As a result, the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) has appealedto Barbadians notto waste water. The BWA itself, however, must also pay attention, sincethere are a numberof burst pipes throughout the island.We want to get those pipes fixed as quickly as possible, so we propose to help the BWA by highlighting the wastage. If you see a burst pipe or can tell us where water is being wasted, email bryanwalker@nationnews.com.