- Warning -

Heightened risk of water bursts and leaks

Southern Water briefing 15th December


With temperatures set to rise rapidly this weekend, the frozen ground is likely to rapidly thaw – known as a ‘freeze/thaw’ event.

This can cause a heightened risk of bursts and leaks, so Southern Water will be reminding customers directly to be on alert over the coming days, and offering advice about how to prepare their properties - and how to reach them in an emergency.

Southern Water have produced a briefing note containing the most useful resources for customers: -

In an emergency, customers can Southern Water 24/7 on 0330 303 0368

With a thaw predicted in the next few days, the most important thing is to ensure people know where their stop cock is located, should they need to turn the water off in the event of a burst. Where is my stop tap? (southernwater.co.uk)

With businesses closing for the Christmas holidays, Southern Water are urging business owners to turn off the water if their premises will be unoccupied over the holidays. For more tips on how to prepare for cold weather, visit: Retailer useful information (southernwater.co.uk)

There’s supporting information available at: Prepare your home for winter (southernwater.co.uk) and How to stop your pipes freezing and bursting in cold winter weather (southernwater.co.uk). Southern Water also post regular updates on social media channels – Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.

Southern Water have put in place a number changes across the business aimed at mitigating risk and improving their response to any incidents:

  • Early and frequent communications to customers
  • New measures to assess when severe weather is likely to have significant impact on water networks
  • A complete overhaul of their incident management system, from identifying the potential for an incident, through preparation stages and actual incident handling to post-event management.
  • Major investment to improve the resilience of their networks. In particular, Southern Water added many more remote sensing devices to the water network to better monitor flows and deliver updates in real-time.
  • Southern Water are also working more closely with Local Resilience Forums.

If you have any questions, please get in touch with Southern Water.

Notice Date: 15/12/2022