BT joint/manhole/chamber on pedestrian waterlogged!

Hey all

I had a fault on my BT line where it was severely crackling. BT came round opened the joint/manhole (located on the pedestrian on my side of the road, directly outside the house) only to find the chamber is 95% fully flooded. The point box inside wasn't water tight so all the telephone lines have been affected due to this flooding.

The engineer cleared the flood (using buckets etc...) down to around 10% water but then after 20 mins the chamber flooded back up to 90/95% again, indicating some sort of water leak near/in the chamber.

He's fixed what he can for now but has advised that this could be a temporary fix as the flooding could affect the line. The permanent fix is for the chamber not to be flooded/have any water in the BT chamber whatsoever.

What do I do to fix this? Do I report this to the water company? Does BT report this? What's the procedure to get the ball rolling on an investigation/fix?

TIA

Edited by Bobby_Valentino (Thu 14-Dec-23 12:43:32)

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

So true

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

Interesting! Wouldn't it be logical to fix any potential water leak along with making the joint waterproof? This way it fixes any potential water pressure issues going into homes and the BT line is waterproof.

Edited by Bobby_Valentino (Thu 14-Dec-23 12:45:03)

In reply to a post by Bobby_Valentino:

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

Interesting! Wouldn't it be logical to fix any potential water leak along with making the joint waterproof?

May not turn out to be a water leak, possibly just ground water levels

In reply to a post by PCJM40:

In reply to a post by Bobby_Valentino:

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

Interesting! Wouldn't it be logical to fix any potential water leak along with making the joint waterproof?

May not turn out to be a water leak, possibly just ground water levels

It's unlikely to be waste water as there was no foul smell or anything but isn't it worth logging to the water company for an inspection at least?

There's been a lot of rain lately, so ground water levels are high, so probably not a leak from the water supply or drainage. I don't believe the water company would be bothered to investigate it. These boxes are very often full of water.

I spent many happy hours and many unhappy hours pumping manholes. Many times on shifts with pumps running 24/7 whilst we were working.

When we were underground we often had to run sheeting to channel the water away from the work.

You will never stop the water coming in to underground structure.

I think half the problem is the guys who know what they are doing keeping the copper watertight are becoming rarer as they retire or take the redundancy money.

The water company can test for chlorine in the box but they are unlikely to do much about a leak in my experience. And the telecom engineer is not going to hang around waiting for the water board if he can help it.

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

The permanent fix is to make the joint waterproof. You will never stop the groundwater in the box.

Exactly right FB