A warning has been issued following an incident whereby a manhole cover ‘flew out of’ the back of a car in Llanelli today, Tuesday (Jul 18). Matthew Edmunds who works for Welsh Water contacted Llanelli Online to highlight the incident, which occurred on New Dock Road in Llanelli.
Matthew spotted a post on Facebook by Katherine Morgan, which detailed what happened. Katherine wrote: “Well done to the irresponsible ar****le who could have caused a serious accident but didn’t even stop or return. Some car bombed up New Dock Road, a weighty manhole cover flew out the back of the car. I thought at first they’s been driving with the boot open but seems the weight of the cover probably forced the boot open. The manhole cover flew out dented the road then tic tac toed along the road landing on the middle. I had a luckily just got on the pavement. Myself ad a small child were nearby could have hit any of us or another car. I dread to think of the potential outcomes. I couldn’t lift the cover as it was so heavy. A passer by stopped their car to move it to the pavement. The driver of the vehicle did not come back. If this was a genuine accident and they had nothing to hide they’d have stopped.”
Speaking about the dangers of an exposed drainage chamber Matthew said: “I work for Welsh Water and I know how deep some of these chambers are. They go down about three or four metres. These are heavyweight covers and cannot be lifted by one person. We have to use lifting implements, we are not allowed to pick them up on our own.
“This was a big round circular manhole cover. It would have taken quite a strong person to pick it up. It could have come from anywhere. They used to be stolen quite a lot but since scrapyards stopped taking them there have not been many thefts.”
UPDATE:
Apparently the incident is not an isolated one as other residents have called Llanelli Online since our initial report was published to report missing manhole covers in the Morfa area of the town. One resident told us that the County Council have been in the area today replacing some of the missing covers.
We will contact the council for a statement in due course. If anyone does notice a missing manhole cover you are asked to report it to Welsh Water or Carmarthenshire County Council.
