Karachi water supply suspended after pipeline burst

KARACHI: The citizens of the metropolis on Thursday suffered massive disruption in water supply after a pipeline at the Dhabeji pumping station burst this morning.

Karachi Water & Sewerage Board teams were deployed to repair the damaged pipeline, thus halting supply to the city until the repair work completes.

The executive engineer at the KWSB said the pipeline that has 72-inch diameter burst today due to power breakdown, resultantly suspending water supply to many areas of the city.

The main sources of water for Karachi are Keenjhar Lake (Indus River) and Hub dam, from where water is pumped through three main bulk pumping stations located at Dhabeji, Gharo, and Hub.

Karachi is facing an acute shortage of water following a drastic drop in water levels at the Hub dam. Owing to the low supply from the dam, many areas in the western and central districts of the city are facing water shortage.

A 30-kilometer-long canal from Hub dam supplies around 100 mgd water to Karachi.

Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) recently reacted to media reports as a spokesman saying that he couldn’t confirm the exact measurement of the level of the water in the Hub Dam. He also added saying that many areas connected to the dam water supply are seriously affected and facing acute water shortage.

Lack of rainfall in the dam catchment area has created drought-like situation, while a major portion of the dam’s reservoir, which is around 26 square kilometers has almost dried up with hardly half a foot of water left the spokesman said.

The Hub canal with its designed capacity supplies around 100 million gallons of water daily (mgd) to the metropolis.

The dam’s old structure and poor maintenance had resulted in leakages and breaches in the water body.

To maintain the water supply to a certain quantity the water being diverted from the Indus distribution system to Hub Dam.