Torrential rain cuts off water to 40pc of homes
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MORE than 50,000 people in Cork city -- almost 40pc of the city population -- are now likely to be without running water for at least a week.
People are being forced to drive to the homes of friends and family to have showers and use the toilet as there is no running water -- or drinking water -- in much of the city.
It has also emerged that the Lee Fields water station -- which supplies strategic areas of the city centre and northside -- was at one point under almost 20ft of flood water.
The lack of water for hygiene purposes in some parts of Cork city has now raised public health fears of an easier spread of swine flu -- and one emergency worker said it was like "an Irish Hurricane Katrina".
Last night, Cork City Council acknowledged that sanitation and public health are now matters of "serious concern".
Hundreds of workers in water-dependent occupations, such as catering, food processing and cleaning, also face the threat of being laid off.
Such is the scale of the damage that most Cork primary and secondary schools will remain closed today while University College Cork (UCC) has suspended all lectures until November 30.
Damage
Large parts of Cork city remain closed to traffic as emergency crews work frantically to repair damage.
Engineers were last night working around the clock in Cork in a desperate effort to repair and get the city's main water supply system back on line.
Cork City Manager, Joe Gavin, said the scale of flood damage to strategic water systems was far worse than the authority had feared. "We just cannot commit to any (repair) timescale because we are just at this stage dismantling the machinery and our engineers are checking it out to see what needs to be done to get it back into working order," he told the Irish Independent.
"We don't see, in the current situation, any return to normality before the end of next week unfortunately," Mr Gavin added.
In the interim, the council is operating five major water tanker centres -- and extra tankers are being sourced from around Ireland, should they be required.
The Civil Defence, Red Cross and other agencies are on standby to assist if needed.
Cork householders with access to water are asked to show "community spirit" towards friends, relatives and those who are without running water and require sanitation facilities.
- Ralph Riegel
Irish Independent
