17 July 2023 – 14:00

Media Statement

Majority of Johannesburg Water systems make steady recovery

Large parts of Johannesburg suburbs have had water supply restored; however, high-lying areas are still experiencing low water pressure.
The entity continues to supply water tankers to the critical areas.

Although work has been completed, Johannesburg Water customers are reminded that full recovery will take five to 14 days. Customers in higher-lying areas will experience the outage for a longer period as the network gradually recovers.

Customers who have regained supply are urged to use water sparingly, only for drinking and cooking, and hygiene purposes. Please refrain from watering your gardens, filling up swimming pools, and using hose pipes to wash cars.

Soweto
The Orlando reservoir levels have improved and capacity has increased to 16%. Flows are back to normal. The Meadowlands and Braamfischerville reservoir zones continue to struggle with water supply. Technical teams are flushing the infrastructure in the area to get rid of airlocks in the system. Johannesburg Water continues to supply alternative water supply.

Randburg/Roodepoort
Majority of the reservoirs and towers are recovering and will continue to build up storage overnight. The Blairgowrie reservoir levels have increased and are sitting at 30% capacity, while flows have improved. The Linden 1 reservoir is at 6%, while the Linden 1 tower has improved and is at 45%. The areas supplied by these three systems are still struggling with water. These three systems are still struggling because they are situated at a higher altitude in the system. Furthermore, they are fed by Rand Water’s Waterval reservoir, so, as the Waterval reservoir gains capacity, so will these systems.

Commando system (Brixton, Hursthill, Crosby)
Supply at the Commando meter continues to recover. At the Crosby reservoir, supply is still on recovery and inflows are increasing. The Brixton reservoir outlet is open at 100% and the tower is operating normally. The Hursthill 1 reservoir has gained capacity and is sitting at 13% with low inflows, while the Hursthill 2 reservoir has a capacity of 15% and inflows are also low. Hursthill 2 reservoir should be able to supply high-lying areas of that zone.

Johannesburg South and CBD
The Crown Gardens reservoir outlet is opened at 100% and has improved capacity to 70%, from Sunday’s 62%. Pumping at the Crown Gardens towers took place overnight and supply in this system should be back to normal. However, high-lying areas are still struggling with low pressure to no water. The Parktown 2 reservoir has improved significantly and is sitting at 41%, while the Berea reservoir is at 15% and continues to be on an upward path compared to previous days.

Loadshedding continues to affect recovery times. This is due to the fact that the system is currently in recovery mode, so any loadshedding would affect recovery times as pumping is interrupted during power outages.

Ends

Issued by: Johannesburg Water Communication and Marketing.