Water has returned for all households across Hampshire after thousands went without supplies for nearly two days, amid frustration over increased bills.
Southern Water said all properties were back on supply at full water pressure at just before 2am on Friday after overnight work to restore supply to homes and businesses.
The utility company said it was “sorry for the disruption”, also apologising to customers with extra support needs who had to “wait an unacceptably long time to receive their water deliveries”.
Southern Water warned that some customers may “notice airlocks in their pipes” as supplies resume, adding that this was normal and if running taps does not resolve it they can arrange for a plumber.
The company added that discoloured water was normal when taps first run following an outage.
The issues began on Wednesday morning, with homes in Southampton, Romsey, Eastleigh, Totton and parts of the New Forest experiencing a loss of water or low pressure.
The utility company said on Friday morning that its Testwood works is now fully operational, with all dependent storage reservoirs re-filling.
Tim McMahon, managing director for water at Southern Water, said Testwood was a “very old works”.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme: “The problem is when you start to build on these old assets, it’s very hard sometimes to get those sites working in the way that we need to, to get potable drinking water away to the customers.
“And unfortunately, a couple of days ago, that process struggled, and we couldn’t get the water away.”
Southern Water said deliveries of bottled water continued over the night to customers on the Priority Services Register who have extra communication, access or safety needs.
The utility company stated that three bottled water stations would open on Friday morning at Staplewood Football Development Centre, Southampton, Places Leisure Centre, Eastleigh, and Calshot Road car park.
In a statement, Mr McMahon said: “We are sorry for the disruption caused to customers over the last two days, and would like to thank them for their patience as we worked to restore supply.
“We also apologise to those customers on the Priority Services Register who had to wait an unacceptably long time to receive their water deliveries. We’ll review this incident carefully and learn the lessons to improve our processes.”
Regulator Ofwat announced that Southern Water customers will face a 53% increase in bills over the next five years – significantly higher than the average bill increase of 36% across England and Wales.
Retired nurse Jill Woolger, 66, from Dibden Perlieu near the New Forest, called the increase in water bill charges “bonkers”.
She told the PA news agency: “The fact that we’re being stung for the highest increase in water charges… How bonkers is that?”
Mr McMahon told Radio 4 on Friday that Southern Water was “investing more to get these assets into the position they should be so we do not have incidents like this going forward”.
