Water supply to parts of Karachi resumes after power at Dhabeji pumping station restored

KARACHI: Water supply to several parts of Karachi resumed in phases on Monday after electricity supply was resumed at the Dhabeji pumping station, around 22 hours after a power breakdown, Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation spokesperson Abdul Qadir Shaikh told Dawn.

The spokesperson said K-Electric (KE) had restored power supply to the pumping station at 7:20am on Monday, around 22 hours after a cable fault suspended the supply at 8:43am on Sunday.

He said the “prolonged outage had resulted in a shortfall of nearly 48 million gallons of water in the city” and the affected areas included parts of North Nazimabad, Nazimabad, Gulberg Town, New Karachi, Landhi, Korangi and Scheme 33.

“Following the restoration of electricity, water supply to the affected areas has resumed in phases,” the spokesperson said.

The Dhabeji pumping station, Karachi’s primary water intake point, is highly dependent on uninterrupted electricity. Even brief outages result in immediate service disruptions.

The power breakdown on Sunday had resulted in the temporary shutdown of three pumps at Dhabeji, which KWSC initially attributed to a cable fault.

The water utility’s spokesperson had told Dawn that a technical team had reached the site to rectify the fault.

However, a KE spokesperson had clarified that the fault in KDA Pumping Feeder 2, which supplies electricity to the Dhabeji Pumping Station, “is internal in nature and is not related to K-Electric”.

“Power supply to 19 out of 22 pumping motors at the Dhabeji Pumping Station is continuing as normal,” the spokesperson had said, adding that a power utility team was in contact with the relevant authorities to assist KWSC in addressing the fault.

Earlier this month, an electricity outage at the K-2 Pumping Station had caused three major pumps at the K-2 Pumping Station to shut down.