Sheffield gas supplies should be restored by tonight after 10 days without, say engineers

Almost 2,000 homes in the Stannington and Malin Bridge areas of the city lost gas supplies 10 days ago when a burst water main filled the local gas network with more than a million litres of water. More than 250 engineers from the network operator Cadent worked through the weekend but said the heavy snow which hit north Sheffield early on Sunday morning, hampered their attempts to get to some streets.

Cadent spokeswoman Stephanie Van Rosse said on Monday that most of the households still affected are in the lower suburb of Malin Bridge, where the firm is continuing to pump hundreds of thousands of litres of water from its pipes.

She said: "Yesterday we started at 8am but, because of the snow overnight, we had some challenges getting up the hill. Once the snow had melted more we were able to get our resources up there but we were a couple hours behind where we would like to be.

"We got a lot more people back on gas but we were hoping that by yesterday evening we would have got everybody back on gas, if we were able to get access to them. But, because of the weather situation, that's put us back."

Ms Van Rosse said it was only possible to fully connect homes if people are able to let engineers in to perform vital tests.

She said: "The aim is that, if people are at home, and we don't have any further water issues, we will get people back on gas today."

She said teams will be on site for a number of days to make sure they can access all homes.

Ms Van Rosse said: "At some properties we've got gas up to the gas meter but we haven't been able to go in and do the safety checks internally. We will keep on revisiting and revisiting."

She said the firm still had three 30,000 litre tankers collecting pumped water from Malin Bridge and around a million litres will have been removed from the network by the end of the operation.

"It's frustrating for us because we have people there to get people back on gas but, because of the water, until that's all gone, we can't get gas back in there. We really appreciate the patience of people, specifically in Malin Bridge. We know how difficult it is. It's a very challenging time for people. We understand that."

Cadent has worked with Sheffield City Council to make sure all vulnerable people have been visited and Northern Powergrid has provided food trucks in the affected areas. Households have been provided with electric heaters and hotplates for cooking but families have been warned to be careful with electricity use so the local power network is not overloaded.

Last week, Yorkshire Water defended its response after local people blamed the company for the situation. The firm confirmed it was a pipe laid in 1970 which failed as residents said it was just latest in a series of mains burst in ageing network under strain from an expanding suburb.