*Photograph: John Mangan
STANDBY CREWS will be in place for Willie Clancy week should a water outage occur in West Clare for the third week in a row.
No planned water outages are scheduled for the Miltown Malbay area during the Willie Clancy festival which runs from July 6th to 14th and will see in the region of 10,000 descend on the West Clare town.
Following successive water outages on the past two Sundays, locals are on high alert that a repeat scenario could take from the festival.
“Uisce Éireann has organised that crews will be on standby during the festival in the event that any supply interruptions occur. Our repair crews will be able to respond to any such incidents immediately,” a spokesperson Uisce Éireann told The Clare Echo.
On the criticisms surrounding the communication of recent outages, the spokesperson stated, “For unplanned outages, such as Sunday’s outage in West Clare, Uisce Éireann crews immediately investigate the issue and work as a matter of priority to restore normal water supply to impacted homes and businesses as quickly and as safely as possible. For unforeseen or unplanned outages, or emergency events, it was not possible to provide advance notice to customers, however, information including the restoration time, is added to the Uisce Éireann website at https://www.water.ie/water-supply/supply-and-service-update/ as soon as possible following notification of the water supply issue.
“We also directly notify customers who have signed up to our priority and special services register. Business Customers can call our Business Team on 0818 778 778 / International +353 1 707 2827. Lines open Mon-Fri, 9am-5:30pm. Business customers can sign up to Uisce Éireann’s text alert system to receive updates on supply interruptions over four hours in duration at www.water.ie/business-updates”.
For planned disruptions Uisce Éireann endeavours to give customers a minimum of forty eight hours notice “prior to any planned water shut-offs in accordance with the customer care guidance required by the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities (CRU). Uisce Éireann wishes to assure customers that no planned disruptions will take place during the festival in Miltown Malbay. Uisce Éireann understands the inconvenience when an unplanned outage occurs and thanks customers for their patience while we work to restore supply”.
Uisce Éireann continues to work carry out mains rehabilitation works across County Clare under its national Leakage Reduction Programme to reduce supply interruptions. In recent months, 3km of old and damaged water mains have been replaced with new, modern pipes in in Ennis, Ennistymon and Creegh, driving down the amount of clean and treated water lost to leakage. Three years ago, Uisce Éireann installed 4.7km of new water mains from Mullagh and Milltown Malbay to reduce bursts and supply disruptions for customers in the area.
