Swimming in the canals is no surprise to Jamaicans as children can usually be seen enjoying the constant flowing water during the summer periods.

But persons with entrepreneurial minds have taken it a step further and have been hosting water parties along the waterway.

When managing director of the National Irrigation Commission (NIC) Mark Richards told the

Jamaica Observer of the canal splashes, eyebrows were raised. According to Richards, Jamaicans have in recent times been hosting parties along the NIC- operated canals across the island.

“The canal splashes that continue to occur within our canals, which are illegal, are parties that are advertised along the canals that are using water in the canals,” Richards explained.

“And what they will do is block the canals and flood the area to create a pond or pool and that is also illegal,” he continued.

He stated his concern that should a patron of the party be injured, the company would be negatively affected.

“It’s first a safety issue because if anybody gets injured there, then it’s ours. We have to highlight the risk and not legitimise it by saying that this party is on just to have people understand that this is against the law,” Richards lamented.

Though a danger to patrons and illegal, the head said it has been difficult to catch perpetrators and prevent the occurrence.

“There are a number of issues we have to deal with and we’re looking at ways and means to have that done,” he noted.

“When we hear of that (the party), we call in the police but sometimes we are hearing it after the event because we hear people call in at the radio station and say ‘I went to this party down there (by a canal) and it was the water party of the year’,” he stated.

He said he has only heard of parties mainly in Spanish Town and Clarendon areas.

“There’s a history to it. It has always been the practice, especially during summer when children are using the canals and all of that and so we have really been trying to prevent or to minimise it,” corporate secretary to the NIC, Paola Arscott stated.

She too highlighted the safety hazard this practice poses and warned that such occurrences need to be stopped. “I mean we have had some very tragic incidents as a result of the practice because the children are supervised,” she lamented.

Highlighting that it is a very wide area to be policed, the corporate secretary discouraged persons from using the canals for recreational purposes.

But persons have also been commercialising the NIC’s water to set up car washes according to Milton Henry, director of engineering and technical services.

“So I suspect kids will always have been swimming in it but now you seeing the additional challenge of people using it for other purposes including commercialising – car washes and canal splashes. And these are really added to the risk and the challenge with managing it,” he stated.

He attributed the canals’ commercialisation to the fact that the areas where canals are located have become developed hence have an increase in the population surrounding them.

“What has happened is you can imagine these systems would have been built more than 100 years ago some of them at that time the population around Spanish town for example was small, now you see that expansion and the interaction with the water is always going to be there,” he explained.

The NIC is an entity under the auspices of the ministry of agriculture and fisheries that is responsible for providing irrigation services primarily to the agricultural sector as well as to some industrial and commercial users through its systems.

It has 250 kilometres of open canals that collects untreated water from rivers and underground water sources across the island.

When asked why the organisation had not moved to close all canals, the managing director noted that a lack of money has hindered such occurrence.