Paddy Burke at his home in Bryanstown, Balinea last week.Photo: John McCauley
The family who live between Mullingar and Loughanavalley are at the end of their rope after enduring eight years of tremendous obstacles to ensuring a steady water supply.
Paddy Burke, from Bryanstown, Ballinea, Co. Mullingar, said he and his family had been “handed over from Billy to Jack” among various agencies, causing daily water outages that typically last seven to eight hours, including peak hours. He said he was not happy to end it. times.
Paddy is puzzled as to what caused the blackout. He said that locally his infrastructure has been tested for leaks and none have been detected. Other households near the Burks home in Bryanstown don’t have much of a problem with water supply. What really makes the problem mysterious is that the blackouts follow a pattern.
“We usually run out of water between 2:30pm and around 10pm every day,” Paddy explains. “I can’t even flush the toilet during that time. We’ve been doing this for eight years.”
Also, the main water connection problem in the paddy fields seems to be getting worse.
“Most of the time it was a problem during the summer, but it eased up a bit during the winter. This is the first time we’ve had trouble during the winter as well,” Paddy explained.
Paddy is a resident of Westmeath County Council, and when the problem first arose in 2015, his first point of contact was with Westmeath County Council’s water services section.
“They took me to Irish Water and I called them a few times. I was taught.
“Since then I’ve been back and forth, but with no joy. I was speaking on this issue a couple of years ago in Midlands 103. Peter Burke tried on my behalf, and Irish I rode the water 3 or 4 times and got no answer.”
Paddy and his wife Sabrina live in Bryanstown with four of their eight children. Four girls wake up at 6am and take a shower before going to school. Because there are no supplies at night. Paddy buys large amounts of bottled water every week to ensure supplies of drinks, cooking, toothpaste and other essentials.
“I can’t count how much I spend on bottled water,” Paddy continued. “You have to use at least two or three five-liter bottles a day.”
This house was one of the first to get water meters when Irish Water first introduced the new technology, but it is the only one in the district that appears to be in trouble.
“I don’t know what’s causing it, but it’s going like clockwork every day. It’s like flipping a switch,” he concluded.
The Westmeath Examiner contacted Uisce Éireann last Friday about the Burke family case. A spokesperson for the utility responded Tuesday afternoon, saying that Uisce Éireann will be in direct contact with Paddy in the near future.
