Karachi could face a shortfall of 100 million gallons of water per day (MGD) due to a power breakdown at the Dhabeji Pumping Station, which is expected to be fully repaired by today, the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC) said on Sunday.
The Dhabeji Pumping Station is a key pumping station operated by KWSC, Karachi’s sole water utility, that serves the city’s major areas. Past breakdowns at the facility have impacted supply to the East and Central districts, including areas like Nazimabad, New Karachi, Landhi and Korangi.
In a statement, a KWSC spokesperson said the “major” power breakdown in the second phase of the Dhabeji station was reported at 6:35am.
“Due to the sudden power suspension, 72-inch line No. 5 has been affected, while four pumps of the phase shut down,” a later statement by the KWSC said, adding that the issue “severely damaged” the water supply system.
“According to initial estimates, the city could face a shortage of 100 million gallons of water due to the pumps’ shutdown and the line being impacted,” the KWSC cautioned.
It said water supply to the city was resumed by restoring power supply to two pumps of the station’s second phase at 9am. The other two pumps will also be made functional again as soon as the repair work on the affected pipeline is complete, the utility added.
The repair work of the affected line had been initiated on an “emergency basis” on the directives of KWSC Chief Executive Officer Ahmed Ali Siddiqui, the statement noted.
It assured the citizens that KWSC’s technical teams were “utilising all resources in making every effort to restore the water supply from the affected line”.
According to the statement, the restoration work is expected to be completed by Monday, after which the entire system of the Dhabeji Pumping Station will be operational again as usual.
The KWSC asserted that repair work of the affected line “will be completed on an emergency basis”, and assured citizens that the utility’s management was making every effort to complete the repair work in a timely manner.
“As soon as the repair work has been completed, Dhabeji Pumping Station’s system will return to routine,” the utility added.
The statement recalled that electricity at the Dhabeji station had remained suspended for “many hours” on November 5, November 11 and November 13 due to a “cable fault of K-Electric in the second phase, fourth phase and the K-III Pumping House”.
The KE said on November 14 (Friday) that power on 20 of the 22 pumps had been restored. The utility blamed “leakages” in the KWSC’s water pipelines for damaging the underground electricity cables.
The Dhabeji Pumping Station, which is the city’s primary water intake point, is highly dependent on uninterrupted electricity. Even brief outages result in immediate service disruptions.
The station has been facing multiple problems related to poor maintenance and technical issues for a decade, with multiple breakdowns this year alone, leaving residents in many areas grappling with a water crisis.
Karachi faced a shortfall of 100MGD in January after “two water pipelines burst due to a power outage” at the Dhabeji station. The facility also remained without electricity for at least three days in late June, causing a shortfall of 350MGD.
Last month, one pump at the Dhabeji station was taken offline for maintenance-related needs, while the North East Pumping Station already faced a power breakdown.
Due to persistent water shortages across the city, people mostly rely on water tankers. They, however, face a great deal of hardship in getting them, as the water utility receives more bookings than the quota of water reserved for each district.