Stannington gas floods: Yorkshire Water 'working hard' on repairs

Yorkshire Water has said there was an "overwhelming" number of homes in need of repairs after a gas main flood in Stannington, Sheffield, in December.

The company told a public meeting that it expected to find 30 cases when it took over the repairs in March, but instead found 400 outstanding claims.

Some residents have been without boilers, gas fires or cookers for nearly five months, the meeting heard.

Yorkshire Water's Neil Dewis said the firm was "working hard" to solve cases.

Almost 3,000 homes were left without gas on 2 December as a result of a burst water main.

Hundreds of domestic gas appliances such as boilers and fires were affected by water entering the gas main, with many residents seeing water gushing out of their cookers and gas meters.

Yorkshire Water took over the outstanding repairs from Cadent on 1 March.

Mr Dewis told a public meeting on Thursday that Cadent had already dealt with around 2,000 repairs when the water firm took over.

He said the company expected there to be "20 or 30" outstanding cases but loss adjustor Charles Taylor encountered 400 applications.

"The loss adjustor was overwhelmed at the start, they have dealt with it very well since then," Mr Dewis said.

He told the meeting that there were still about 205 outstanding cases and the company was aiming to settle the claims within the next 20 days.

Many residents said they feared problems would arise with their gas boilers in the future if any water remained in the pipes.

David Yeomans said: "I'm worried about the appliances not working in the future, in six months, when there's sediment water still in the network.

"Who's going to pick up the tab for all that?"

Mr Dewis said he would speak to Cadent about the issue and added: "We heard clearly that people are really concerned about the future and I'm going to take that away and see what we can do about that."

A drop-in session will be held at Lomas Hall in Stannington on 3 May from 11:00 BST to 17:00 BST where residents can meet loss adjustors and gas safe engineers.

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