10:27, UK, Saturday 12 March 2016
Thousands of people in parts of Derbyshire and Leicestershire have been warned not to use their water supply because of abnormal chlorine levels.
Severn Trent customers at around 3,700 properties in postcodes DE11, DE15, DE65, DE73 and the LE65 area were told they should not use it for drinking, washing or preparing food until further notice.
The water company said the warning was a precaution while it investigates "a problem with higher than normal levels of chlorine" at one of its service reservoirs in Castle Donington.
It added: "We're sorry for the inconvenience this will cause and we're working hard to isolate the problem and get everything back to normal as quickly as possible."
Customers have been told they can now flush their toilets as normal after initially being advised not to.
Severn Trent said bottled water is available at Sainsbury's in Swadlincote, and in Tesco in Ashby-de-la-Zouch.
Owen Pritchard, who lives in Chellaston, told Sky News he had only found out about the warning through a friend who had seen a news report about it.
Mr Pritchard said he had realised something was wrong when he used his dishwasher, adding: "The smell from the dishwasher was extremely strong of chlorine.
"It smelt a little like a swimming pool."
Another told Sky's Tom Parmenter in Ashby she only found out about the problem towards the end of Friday after drinking water all day.
She said: "I don't do Twitter, I don't really do Facebook, I don't listen to the news so I drank water all day yesterday so did all my family.
"I was very disappointed by Severn Trent as they texted two of my neighbours and they didn't text us. I'm not an elderly person - I can go on the website - but if you don't know there's anything wrong, you don't know to look. Elderly people who don't do the internet perhaps wouldn't know at all."
Local MP for Ashby Andrew Bridgen said lessons needed to be learned.
He told Sky News: "We have had a communication problem. Obviously the message got out, through the media and social media, but not everyone has access to that. A lot of people claim they've heard it from their neighbours.
"In the good old days we used to have people going around with megaphones informing people of things like this and perhaps that isn't a bad idea. Perhaps we need to review how we get things like this out to the people."
Severn Trent said anyone who had drunk the water but did not notice a strong chlorine taste or smell was unlikely to have been harmed.
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