River clear up starts as Swindon sewer bursts for third time

Raw sewage has been flowing into the River Ray in Swindon as a sewer pipe burst for the third time.

Thames Water deployed 30 tankers to the incident on Wednesday (March 1) near the Haydon End Sewer Pumping station in the town.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the company said teams had been "working around the clock"

“On Wednesday evening, 1 March, we responded to a burst sewer near our Haydon End Sewer Pumping station.

"More than 30 tankers have been working around the clock to pump the sewage away. This has enabled us to prevent flooding to local properties and limit the impact to the local environment.

"We will continue to communicate with customers during this time.

"We’d like to assure customers they will be able to use water and flush toilets as normal during this time and to offer our apologies for any disruption caused by the tankers over the coming days.”

Engineers have been on the scene today (March 3) repairing the pipe and undertaking a clean-up operation. Six tankers are in place to remove the sewage.

Thames Water says the clean-up operation is expected to last over the weekend, but it could take longer depending on the scale of the damage to the pipe.

The tankers are stationed around the Tawny Owl pub, and nearby land has been closed to traffic to ensure the vehicles have access.

Thames Water was forced to deploy tankers to the Haydon End Sewer Pumping Station in November following a similar leak that again resulted in pollution to nearby waterways.

The sewage pipe previously burst in April 2021 and again in August 2022.