Burst water main floods Pattingham

Thursday 3rd February 2011, 3:55PM GMT.

A farmer cut through a water pipe in a village near the Shropshire border sending water shooting 100ft into the air and turning nearby roads into muddy rivers – leaving 800 properties without supplies.

Homes in Moor Lane, Pattingham, had their gardens flooded with dirty water as it gushed down from fields behind yesterday.

Some homes were left without water for several hours as Severn Trent Water cut supplies to stem the leak.

The water firm said a farmer had “sheered off the air valve” which led to a large gap in the pipe.

A river of water gushed through Les Perry’s back garden and onto the road at the front of his home.

The transport manager for Walsall Iron & Steel was at work when the water started coming into his garden and rushed home after getting a call from his wife Pat.

The burst water main

Mr Perry, 57, said: “As I was driving back home I saw the water shooting into the air. It was higher than the electricity pylons in the field. I couldn’t believe it.

“We now have a foot of water in our back garden.”

Another Moor Lane resident whose garden flooded was housewife Glynis Watkins, 54, who has lived in the street for 31 years. She said: “Thankfully the water didn’t go into the house.

Sarah O’Kane, from Severn Trent Water, said engineers fixed the problem. She said: “We managed to turn off supplies leaving 800 properties without water.”

She said the firm had worked to get the supplies restored within three hours.