Southern Water has been forced to stop work laying new pipes to Sheppey after engineers came across 'unforeseen issues' while drilling under the Swale.

The works were being undertaken after a major incident was declared in July, when a burst main led to taps running dry in around 30,000 homes during one of the hottest weeks of the year.

This week a spokesman for the water company admitted: "Our drilling work to install the first of the two new pipelines has been stopped temporarily because of unforeseen issues relating to ground conditions. We are working as quickly as we can to mitigate them. We expect to start drilling again in early 2023."

Although Southern Water never gave a time for the work to be completed, it had been hoped it might have been finished by the end of the year.

The spokesman said different layers of soil, clay, gravel and crushed shells and coral were making it difficult to clear spoil from the drill. He said: "Reluctantly we’ve decided the best option is to swop sides and drill back towards the hole we’ve made so far from Sheppey. This means getting new permits, which we are working on as we speak."

The £3m project, which had been agreed in record time, is to provide two new water mains under the Swale to serve the Island which had its supplies cut off in July when the existing pipe burst.

Abandoned pipes which run under the Kingsferry Bridge are also being renewed, although that work has stopped, too, following a gas leak in Ridham Dock Road which SGN has thrown up an exclusion zone.

The spokesman explained: "It is unsafe to work in the area so we have had to pause our work on the insertion pipe through the Kingsferry Bridge and the connections work for the two new pipelines." He added: "We did not cause any damage to the gas main."

"As soon as that is sorted out, and it is safe to do so, we will continue to work on the pipeline through the bridge. We hope this will still be finished as soon as possible."

He added: "Although these issues are outside our control, we would like to apologise for the delay. Up until this point, we had been making significant progress to install the first of the new 400mm pipes under the Swale.

Swale councillor Cameron Beart said: "This is obviously disappointing news but I am glad Southern Water are keeping us informed and updated as this vital project progresses."

Before work started in October, the bed of the Swale was checked for any unexploded bombs.

Senior project manager Peter Simmons previously told Kent Online: “We are drilling through different silts, peat, gravel, stiff London clay, shell deposits and even fossilised root fragments from what could be a prehistoric forest. But we were expecting them as they were detected during our initial surveys.”

During the summer, emergency water supplies had to be shipped in by a fleet of tankers and bottles of water were given out from makeshift distribution centres in supermarket, working men's clubs and arcade car parks.

Sheppey already has an 18-inch (457mm) pipe built in 1960 which runs along the Kingsferry bridge and a larger two-feet (600mm) pipe built in 1979 running under the Swale. The two new pipes will each be 15-inches in diameter (400mm) and will be linked so water can be switched between them.

Once the bore holes are drilled, the new blue pipes now stored on the Sheppey marshes will be pulled through.