Mayo island's water network needs a full upgrade

ACHILL'S water network needs a full upgrade and it's a project that needs to be prioritised.

Consumers in the parish are 'frustrated' by water outages due to the large number of bursts occurring on the network.

Councillor Paul McNamara voiced those frustrations at a municipal meeting where he asked that Uisce Éireann be asked to attend a workshop to discuss matters.

Bursts result in a loss of capacity in the reservoirs, he said, with tankers being hired to transport water to speed up their refill.

Storage capacity in the treatment plant is being upgraded to seven hours, added Councillor McNamara, but that still wasn't sufficient. It should be 24 hours.

Customers are frustrated and some have kept a record of the days they have been without water this year - for some that figure is 24 days.

Without a network system upgrade the problem was only going to get worse, he said.