MONROVIA, Montserrado – A damage to the 36-inch pipe that supplies water to several communities in Monrovia has led to a water outage in the capital and its surroundings for several days.

The Liberia Water and Sewer Corporation supplies water from its White Plains facility through two routes, using 16-inch and 36-inch pipes.

The 16-inch pipe runs from White Plains through the township of Louisiana and supplies Caldwell, Duala, New Kru Town, Clara Town, and Vai Town. The 36-inch pipe runs through Paynesville, Congo Town, Old Road, Lakpazee, and Sinkor.

On Wednesday, February 6, residents were left without water in their homes. A source at the water company, who wished to remain anonymous to avoid retaliation for divulging sensitive information, informed The Bush Chicken that the 36-inch pipe was damaged that day.

Though the source did not disclose the cause of the damage, residents in Paynesville, Congo Town, Old Road, Lakpazee, and Sinkor are said to be out of water.

“If nothing is speedily done to repair the damaged 36-inch pipe, residents in the affected areas will be out of water for the next two weeks,” the source maintained.

Prior to the outage, those areas had also experienced low water pressure, which the LWSC source attributed to a faulty pump at the White Plains Water Treatment Plant outside Monrovia.

On Thursday, February 7, The Bush Chicken witnessed residents in parts of Old Road struggle to fetch water as early as 4 a.m.

LWSC has not yet made an announcement of the cause of the outage. At the company’s headquarter in Central Monrovia, officials could not provide a reason for the outage.

Nixon Toll, the entity’s public relations officer, later told The Bush Chicken via phone that LWSC’s technical team was working to resolve the problem. However, he did not state when water would be restored in the affected communities.

Featured photo by Zeze Ballah