Turbid conditions affecting water to sections of Kingston and St Andrew

The National Water Commission (NWC) has suspended operations at all of its Kingston and St Andrew East rural water supply systems, a number of which are facing high turbidity due to the impact of Tropical Storm Elsa.

Some of the systems affected are Flamstead 1 and 2, Violet Bank, Harbour River Constitution Hill, Content and Clydesdale,

"This means that our valued customers in the east rural St Andrew section, their supply of water would be adversely affected," Corporate Communications Manager at NWC, Andrew Canon told The Gleaner.

Operations at Norwich Water Facility in the Portland has also been suspended as result of high turbidity. Residents in Snow Hill and Passley Gardens Housing Scheme in Portland are presently without water supply.

A similar situation is also in St James at the Tangle River and Vaughnsfield Pump stations, which serves residents in Tangle River, Vaughnsfield and sections of Garlands.

"Our customers must understand that at this time a number of our water systems will be affected by high turbidity and we will have to wait until the weather condition improves before we can deal with the issue of turbidity," Canon said.

He added that the agency is keeping a close eye on Spanish Town Road in Kingston.

"We're doing a major project along the Spanish Town Road to improve supply for residents in sections of downtown Kingston, Central Kingston, and parts of Marcus Garvey Drive. What we did do, we did backfill all the trenches so that there would be no open area and this would be necessary to protect what has been done so far," he said, noting that there is crew on standby to be deal with any eventuality there.

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