Academy forced to close as water outage continues

A statement on the academy’s website says: “We have no water due to the continued disruption of the water supply, therefore the academy will be shut today.

“It is with great regret we have had to close the Academy today with all the disruption we had last week.

“The academy was open yesterday as we had our own water supply until towards the end of lunchtime. Unfortunately today we have no supply.”

Areas of Hastings and Ore have been without a water supply since Saturday afternoon (March 3). The water outage comes as part of a wider number of problems in the water network which have been caused by last week’s extreme winter weather.

On Sunday afternoon (March 4), Southern engineers reported that they had found the source of the Hastings water outage and that work was underway to fix it. However, the company says it is unable to give an update on when water will be returned.

A statement on the Southern Water website says: “Following the recent freeze and rapid thaw, there are multiple bursts on our network which is causing low pressure or loss of supply.

“We have teams out across the region fixing leaks and bursts as soon as possible and we’re putting as much extra water into the network as we can.

“We’re working with local authorities, police and fire services through the local resilience forums to make sure we’re identifying vulnerable customers and providing bottled water where needed.

“Although we know it’s really inconvenient we are asking our customers to save water wherever possible.

“Please do not use water for anything that isn’t essential. Where possible, take short showers rather than baths, do not leave taps running unnecessarily and only run washing machines and dish washers when you have a full load. This will make a real difference.

“We sincerely apologise to all those customers affected.”

Southern tweeted on Monday evening (March 5) to say: “We’re so sorry to customers in TN34 and TN35, Hastings, who are still without water. We’re balancing levels across the area in order to restore supplies, as well as finding and fixing leaks. If you spot a leak in TN34 and TN35, please report it asap: 0330 030 0146.”