Fire appliances carting water as supply issues continue to affect villages

A multi-agency response involving the department of Utilities led by Clinton Chapman, Niue Power with Brandon Kulatea and Wesley Seumanu’s team at Fire and Rescue services are working together to sort out the water supply issues that have affected many villages for the past several weeks.

Since last week, the village of Hikutavake still depends on water being carted by the Fire Rescue teams.

Last night the Fire rescue team also transported water for the village of Tamakautoga. Water is also being fed from the Avatele water bore to supply Tamakautonga.

Clinton Chapman and Brandon Kulatea provide regular updates and advice through the village council chat group which was set up by the Ministry of Infrastructure to keep tabs on utilities faults around the island.

Chapman and his team have been working around the island for the past several weeks. He says that the problems are faulty water bore pumps, the replacements have been ordered from Australia and will arrive via air-freight.

He is asking that the villages affected conserve water until their supply is returned to normal, “In the meantime please conserve water. Please be assured that we are doing all we can.”

Three weeks ago, Tamakautoga had water pressure problems which also affected the government’s quarantine and managed isolation facility located at Homofiti.

Last week, Lakepa went without water for two days and Avatele also had no water in mid-August.

Meanwhile, the Director of Transport Sonya Talagi who is responsible for the Fire Rescue Services is asking the villages to conserve water. She says that the Fire and Rescue teams are stretched having to cart water to Tamakautoga and Hikutavake. The villages will need to help by conserving water given the current issues as they await the arrival of the replacement parts.