Water shutdown confirmed for this weekend

The anticipated partial shutdown of water supply into Port Moresby, is now confirmed to take place over the weekend, from Friday, July 31 at 10pm to 3am on Sunday, August 2.

Water PNG Chief Executive Officer, James Young, in a statement, said the repair work was deferred earlier, because Water PNG needed time to undertake extensive remedial work, and also acquire materials to shorten the shutdown period to just 29 hours, and not the usual one week.

He said that though the situation remains serious, Water PNG was able to stabilize the situation, by utilising their local engineers and some experts from around the world, to shorten the repair work time, and also prepare for a catastrophic failure during the repairs.

Young also added that the delay in the repair work, has resulted in the city losing about 10 million litres of water each day, through that major leak.

He also said that the partial shutdown, will also reduce the city's water supply from 100 million to 80 million litres per day, and this is undertaken to reduce impacts on households, so residential areas have more access to supplies on Saturday.

Young further added that the longest outage will be experienced in the downtown area, because this is where hotels and houses have the capacity to store water, unlike suburbs and settlements.

The Water PNG CEO, however urged everyone to store enough water, regardless of where they are living, to avoid any issues.