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Water supply problems continue for Kent homes

Bob Dale & Stuart Maisner
BBC News, South East
BBC/Jo Burn Half-empty shelves of bottled water in a supermarket.BBC/Jo Burn
Supplies of bottled water began to run low in local supermarkets on Wednesday

Hundreds of homes in Kent still have problems with their water supply.

South East Water has apologised, blaming the heatwave for the supply issues which began on Wednesday.

On Thursday afternoon it said about 500 customers in Whitstable, Seasalter and the surrounding area were still suffering from "intermittent supply".

A company spokesperson said it was "unable to confirm when supplies will be fully restored to all customers".

The statement added: "We are using four tankers on Thursday to inject water directly into the network and this has helped to restore supplies for some customers in the area."

A bottled water station remains open at Sainsbury's on Reeves Way in Chestfield until 21:00 BST.

Water continues to be delivered to vulnerable customers who are registered on the company's website.

Nick Bell, South East Water incident manager, said: "We're sorry for the inconvenience to customers and we'll continue to work hard to restore supplies as soon as we can."

Alex in Whitstable told BBC Radio Kent that her father-in-law, who has dementia and has had several strokes, had been cut off.

She said she called South East Water to register him as a vulnerable customer.

She said: "What they told me was 'we'd rather put the resources towards fixing the problem, so we don't deliver if you can collect for him'."

She added she was able to arrange collection on Wednesday but said: "If my husband and I had been out of the area, that would have been a real logistical headache.

"My concern now is are we going to keep him stocked up with bottled water for the rest of the summer just in case," she added.

BBC/Jo Burn A woman with shoulder-length blonde hair and a purple polo shirt stands beside a car with an open boot, showing it contains half a dozen bottles of water.BBC/Jo Burn
Geraldine Kent was stocking up on bottled water in case the situation deteriorates again

Geraldine Kent arrived to collect supplies from the bottled water station on Thursday morning.

"We noticed low pressure, so I was running around finding kettles and saucepans, and it was getting lower and lower.

"We're back on now, but I've got some bottles just in case."

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