Karnataka - Mangalore   

Water pipeline bursts at Kankanady

— Photo: R. Eswarraj

TROUBLE: This shop is among the 30 others at Kankanady in Mangalore which were flooded after a 600-mm diameter supply pipeline burst on Saturday.

MANGALORE: Water supply in Mangaladevi, Nandigudda, Valancia, and Jeppinamogaru areas here will be affected on Sunday as the pipeline supplying water to these areas burst at Kankanady on Saturday.

As the 600-mm diameter underground asbestos cement pipeline that runs between Karavali Circle and Lower Bendoorwell Circle road burst at about 2.30 p.m. a portion of the tar road on this stretch caved in.

According to a junior engineer of Mangalore City Corporation, there are many water supply pipelines of different size and types between the two circles.

Earlier, a two-MGD (million gallon litre a day) capacity cast iron pipeline had burst twice on one side of the four-lane road. The pipeline which burst on Saturday was on the opposite side. Saturday’s was the third such incident. Earlier, the pipeline had burst on May 16 and May 26 at two places on the same stretch. The corporation had repaired it on the both occasions.

The water from the burst pipeline entered at least 30 shops, including the ones in the basement of Shah complex, on Saturday.

Water entered the parking area in the basement of Divya Deepa Arcade. Workers at a bookshop were seen shifting the books.

Shop owners in the basement of Shah Complex used buckets to clear water from the basement and inside their shops.

The corporation engineers stopped water supply on the pipeline after sometime.

G.V. Rajashekaramurthy, executive engineer of the corporation, visited the spot. He said that the engineers were yet to find out the reason for the frequent bursting of the pipeline.

It would take at least one-and-a-half day to repair it. If it was delayed the corporation would have to supply water through tankers to affected areas, he said.

Mayor M. Shankar Bhat visited the spot and directed the officials to repair the pipeline at the earliest.

A corporation engineer said that the Karnataka Urban Infrastructure Development and Finance Corporation (KUIDFC) had re-laid the road between the two circles recently. The cement pipeline which burst on Saturday was about 20 years old. The heavy machinery used for laying the road might have damaged the old pipeline, he said.

Traffic movement on the stretch between the two circles was affected for sometime as the road had caved in. The traffic police allowed only light motor vehicles to use one side of the road. Heavy vehicles were allowed to ply two ways on the other side of the road.

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