A breakdown of a water treatment works in Pembury is causing taps to run dry in most of Tunbridge Wells, with issues likely to last all day.
A bottled water station is now open in St John's Road Sports centre in Tunbridge Wells. It's handing out 12 free bottles per household.
There's another bottled water station in Tonbridge at the Sovereign Way car park. Other sites in Tunbridge Wells are expected to be offering bottled water later in the day.
The MP for Tunbridge Wells, Mike Martin, said earlier this morning he had spoken to the CEO of SE Water: "I said that the bottled water station yesterday in Tonbridge was totally unacceptable".
Mike Martin continued: "By the way - it’s ok to drink any residual water last in the system. Anything that comes out of taps is safe."
South East water said in a statement at 11.34am:
"We're sorry to customers in the Tunbridge Wells area who continue to have no water or low pressure. This is due to an issue at our Pembury Water Treatment Works, resulting in the site shutting down.
"This has caused the dependent local drinking water storage tanks to run low. A bottled water station is now open until 10:00 pm this evening, located at: Tunbridge Wells Sports Centre - St John's Rd, TN4 9TX.
"Our customer care team has been delivering bottles of water to all customers on our Priority Services Register who have indicated to us that they would be unable to collect water from a bottled water station.
"We estimate that this will be resolved by Sunday 30th Nov 2025 at 6:00 PM."
Further updates will be posted here by South East Water:
https://aqualerter.southeastwater.co.uk/interruption/138030
West Kent Radio presenter Brian Johnson (pictured below), who lives in Tunbridge Wells said: "We have hot water from the tank currently, although I guess this will run out, so we’ve been able to shower. It’s the drinking water that’s dried up. We’re not at the top of our hill, so usually we’re OK."
The owner of one sandwich shop near the RVP shopping centre, Saunders Sarnies, posted this picture:
Tunbridge Wells MP Mike Martin told BBC Radio Kent he noticed he'd lost water at 2am when he woke up to feed his baby. He said he had spoken to the CEO of South East Water.
He wrote on X, formerly Twitter: "For those who are not aware, the problem has been caused by a bad batch of coagulant chemicals.
"A new set of chemicals have been procured and the team have been working through the night to clean out Pembury Treatment Works.
"The new chemicals will be going in this morning and the system will then need to be checked and charged.
"This may mean that water will be off throughout the day. I will update here as I know more."
Teresa Barrett, who runs the Black Horse on Camden Road, said the pub has been without running water since midnight.
She said: "Sadly this means it is illegal for us to open... if I could, I would be opening."
Losing a day of trading would be "extremely damaging", the landlady said, adding: "I can't afford to be closed, I can't lose a day's trading in the current climate.
"Things are hard enough for hospitality right now, businesses in this sector would have prepared for table bookings today and lost an extreme amount of money, [and] staff will still need to be paid."
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