SANTA CRUZ, St Elizabeth — Residents of Santa Cruz who have been mostly without running water since the passage of Tropical Storm Nicole over a month ago will have to wait until “sometime next week” for service to return, the National Water Commission (NWC) said yesterday.

Ava Marie Ingram of the NWC’s Western Region told the Observer West yesterday that the water company had hoped to resume water supplies before the onset of Tropical Storm Tomas. However, a vital part that was needed to rehabilitate a previously retired well in Santa Cruz had not arrived from overseas.

“We are hoping that by next week the part will be here and we will be able to rehabilitate the old Santa Cruz well,” Ingram said.

Rehabilitation of the old well has become necessary because flooding caused by Nicole has rendered dysfunctional the highly productive year-old Content well just west of Santa Cruz. Turbidity levels at Content are said to be at unacceptably high levels and Ingram suggested yesterday that the water quality from that well will “take sometime to improve”.

The site of large quantities of water gushing from a fire hydrant in the town this week heightened optimism that the NWC was getting set to resume normal service. But Ingram said it was just part of a “quality testing procedure”.