KUALA LUMPUR, July 21 — Pengurusan Air Selangor Sdn Bhd said that pollution from diesel oil had been found at the intake of the Sungai Selangor Water Treatment Plant Phase 1, 2 and 3 (LRA SSP1, LRA SSP2 and LRA SSP3) and the Rantau Panjang LRA from the raw water of Sungai Selangor.

The company’s head of the Customer Relations and Communication Department, Abdul Raof Ahmad said subsequently the Rantau Panjang LRA had to stop operations at 6pm today, followed by the LRA SSP3 at 8pm and LRA SSP1 and LRA SSP2 at 8.15pm tonight.

He said in a statement that the source of the pollution was the sand digging activities at the upper reaches of the river and the incident had been reported to the authorities.

"This is the second incident within three days involving the closure of all four major water treatment plants and causing large scale water supply disruption to the customers,” said Abdul Raof, referring to a similar action taken on Friday following odour pollution.

He said Air Selangor could not ascertain the time frame for recovery if similar pollution of raw water resources recurred.

"We are in a state of preparedness to face any incident as the one that occurred today,” he said.

On Friday, 1,133 areas involving 1,166,842 customer accounts in Kuala Lumpur and Selangor were affected by unscheduled water supply disruption following odour pollution at the Sungai Selangor raw water source.

In a statement earlier today, Air Selangor said it was targeting 100 per cent water supply recovery in all affected areas by midnight on Monday (July 22) before it issued a separate statement on the work stoppage at the four water treatment plants later. — Bernama