The company said it was “disappointed and extremely sorry” that the incident had happened. In a statement, NI Water said: “The cause of the discharge was identified and immediately fixed on Saturday evening and there is no further risk to the river.”
NI Water said the immediate focus now is on working with Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) and local anglers to assess the impact and the needs of the river in terms of re-stocking the fish.
“NI Water manages and maintains over 1,000 wastewater treatment works and over 1,200 wastewater pumping stations and we collect and treat approximately 330 million litres of wastewater every day and return it safely to the environment,” said the company. “The collection, pumping, treatment and disposal of sewage sludge is a complex and energy intensive operation. The failure of any of these elements can cause a pollution incident.
“It is always our aim to protect the environment we operate in. When an incident such as this occurs, our primary aim is to investigate what happened and identify how we can prevent it ever happening again.”
The company added that it was the first public body in Northern Ireland to have earned International ISO 14001 status for all its activities. This is an international quality assurance award based on a company’s environmental management system.