Islamabad, May 1 (IANS) Residents face acute water shortage in Pakistan’s Karachi as the continuous shortfall in water supply, now in its second week, has increased the city’s water problems.
The crisis started on April 21 when the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC) closed a key conduit to connect a newly laid 72-inch diameter pipeline to replace the Line No.5 near Dhabeji Pumping Station, Pakistan’s leading daily Dawn reported.
The planned interconnection caused a 250MGD shortfall, roughly 40 per cent of Karachi’s total daily supply of 650MGD against a demand of over 1,200MGD. The water utility restored 100MGD by the next evening, however, the relief did not continue for a long time as a major power breakdown at the Dhabeji Pumping Station tripped several pumps.
Three 72-inch diameter lines providing water to Karachi had burst at the Dhabeji pumping station on Monday due to a power breakdown, creating a shortfall of 140 million gallons per day (MGD).
The outage caused damage to key installations at Dhabeji, impacting three main supply lines and disrupting water supply to various regions, including Korangi, Malir, Chanesar, Jinnah Town, Landhi, Shah Faisal Colony, Saddar Town, and Clifton.
The KWSC said that emergency repair crews worked and restored the three burst lines by Friday. However, two fresh leakages were found in the 72-inch Line No. 5 at Gulshan-i-Hadeed during power testing. The repair work on the damaged line is being conducted.
The water utility spokesperson said that the net shortfall on Thursday was 80MGD. He added, “With Line 5 still offline, Korangi, Malir, Jinnah Town, Saddar, DHA and Clifton remain worst-hit.” However, people continued to report water shortage in Karachi.
Abdul Ghafoor, a resident, said that they have not received tap water for the past week and was forced to buy water tanker, Dawn reported. A woman said that there was no water in the area for the past five days.
A resident said that people were checking their taps every morning and preparing for another dry day.
(This report has been published as part of the auto-generated syndicate wire feed. Apart from the headline, no editing has been done in the copy by ABP Live.)
