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Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
National
James McNeill

Cafe forced to shut as shop loses hundreds during water pipe chaos

Neighbours along Church Road who were left without running water for over two days said the experience was a "nightmare".

Homes across Sefton were left without water or with low water pressure for two days after a burst main flooded Church Road/Dunnings Bridge Road in Litherland. Locals said that they had to haul buckets of water up the stairs "just to flush the toilet" and some even had to shower in the garden.

People said it was "scary" to realise how reliant there were on fresh water coming into the home. Noticing how they could not carry out simple tasks including washing the dishes or brushing their teeth.

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Mr. Dallah who owns the Church Road Newsagents and the Cross Roads Café next door said that due to the lack of water his business is rapidly losing money. Speaking to the ECHO he said: "I have been without water since Saturday and the water pressure is still bad now.

"I'm losing between £250 to £300 a day as the road has been closed off and nobody is coming in. My café next door has been closed for three days I can't even offer people a cup of tea and I have had to close my shop to go home and use the toilet.

"I need people to walk in and with the road closed there have been no lorries coming past and I've lost £800 since Saturday. I need my water to come back on."

Engineers worked throughout the weekend to solve the issue and with water returned to most of the affected homes early this morning. However over the weekend people were forced to queue outside bottle water stations set up by United Utilities to combat the problem.

One couple Jeff and Dorothy who has lived on Litherland Park Road for 43 years said that they had to "haul" buckets of rain water up the stairs just to flush the toilet and survived on bottles of sparkling water. Jeff said: "We cooked on Friday night so all our dishes and pans were dirty.

Free water handed out at Sainsbury's in Crosby in after a burst water main left thousands of home without water (Liverpool Echo)

"Our washing was piled up over the weekend and none of it could be done. We had to use buckets of rainwater to flush the toilets and bottled water to clean our teeth."

Father of two Phil Kane said that only the outside tap in his garden was working over the weekend and his family had to "shower outside". Phil, 47, from Litherland said: "It was bad, Tesco's offered us free water and we just had to get buy.

"I'm a cancer survivor and had a Laryngectomy that needs cleaning every day, I can't do without clean water. I had to use bottles and do the best I could."

A spokesperson for United Utilities said: “We repaired a burst water main on Church Road in Litherland yesterday afternoon and water supplies started to get back to normal last night. We apologise to those customers in parts of Liverpool who either had no water or poor pressure over the weekend and have already started to automatically process compensation to those affected. Details will be confirmed in emails and letters that will start going out from today.

“Our teams worked throughout the weekend to repair the pipework, and our water tankers were in the area to help boost the pressure and to keep water flowing in the network. Bottled water stations within the community handed out 120,000 bottles of water and our Priority Service customers and nursing homes were provided with 10,000 bottles of water.

“We sent 285,000 messages to customers to keep them updated, and posted updates on our website and social media channels. We offer our sincere apologies for the disruption, thank everyone for their patience and would especially like to pay tribute to Sefton Borough Council and to the Police for their support throughout this incident."

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