6 March, 2026

Stench from faulty mains wastewater system blights family’s summer

Hairi Mangud has been left with filthy water from under his deck

A Forrest Hill resident plagued by repeated wastewater overflows on his property after a main pipe was blocked by concrete despairs of a solution being found.
Hairi Mangud says summer outdoors has been a write-off, with his family forced to stay inside to avoid the smell of filthy water bubbling up from a gully trap under his deck.
The wastewater overflows into the nearby stormwater system, then runs down the back of his Morton Ave section into William Souter Reserve where it enters a small stream, around which conservation volunteers have been trying to restore native bush.
Pupuke Birdsong Project is seeking advice from council’s Healthy Waters on whether it is safe to continue with its first working bee of the year in the reserve this Saturday.
Mangud says the foul water problems have been intermittent but ongoing since late December and Watercare action to date has been inadequate.
This includes cutting a hole in his deck, which is low to the ground, to get to the overflow and installing a noisy bypass pump which has broken down several times. The breakdowns meant a suction truck was sent in by day, parking on the street, but because water pooled overnight it still caused an overflow to the reserve.
The underlying blockage has not yet been dealt with. Watercare says the concrete blocking a wastewater main is affecting two service lines. It describes the case as a “complex remediation project”.
A contractor told Mangud the concrete was likely from a large development nearby, where a manhole cover had been relocated. He had it would be difficult to get at.
Watercare says the issue is being managed as “a potential third-party damage incident” but that it “can’t make assumptions about where the concrete came from”.
Mangud says after he complained Watercare gave him $200 for chemicals to help clean up the polluted deck area, but what he wanted was a timeline for a proper fix. “It really stinks,” he says. He has written to about 20 neighbours explaining the truck’s presence and that the problem was not of his making. “They’re really confused.”
After he copied in Watercare’s chief executive in one complaint and got a response from a customer specialist the next day, the faulty pump was fixed, stopping the overflow for a week, until it broke again.
A fix in mid-February has held so far, but he is left with water in holes dug by his wastewater gully. “There’s a lot of flies and mosquitoes and the smell of course.”He fears further problems if the pipe isn’t cleared.

The father of two, who works in IT, moved to the home three years ago from West Auckland, looking for a “good neighbourhood”. Instead, his young girls had been unable to play outside this hot summer and the sliding door to the deck and windows from the family living area and kitchen have had to remain closed.
Visiting family were unable to enjoy the setting, looking to bush in the reserve.
“I just want someone to take responsibility,” says Mangud. He wanted to take a case against the developer, but Watercare had told him they would deal with the “third party” situation.
Local board member George Wood said the problem Mangud had got caught up in was obviously complex, but Watercare needed to take responsibility for fixing it.
He queried how well council staff were communicating with each other and the impact on the reserve of overflows. Although the portion of the reserve with the stream is up a steep bushy slope above the reserve path, Wood said it was possible young children might play there.
The stream goes into an underground pipe that flows beneath the path.
Watercare said it had informed Auckland Council’s Pollution Hotline about the matter.
Birdsong coordinator Maisie Ramsay says stream monitoring last year had shown signs of fish life. Weeding and planting was done to stabilise the bank and reduce runoff, with the aim of improving water quality.

Watercare ‘works toward solution’

Left: Watercare’s temporary piping runs over a reserve into a manhole.
Right: A small creek in the reserve is being restored by volunteers.

Watercare head of wastewater Jonathan Piggot said the organisation had put temporary measures in place, including a bypass, to ensure 60-plus affected Forrest Hill properties had wastewater services “while we work toward a permanent solution”.
Investigations had confirmed concrete blocking the main but “in complex cases involving legacy infrastructure, it’s not always possible to definitively identify the responsible third party”.
A temporary bypass had a mechanical fault with a generator on 14 February. Remote message alerting was being used to indicate any further power loss and the site was being inspected twice daily.
“This is a complex remediation project involving 1960s-era infrastructure that runs beneath residential properties. The existing network can’t be salvaged, so we are looking at a realignment project, which involves a site survey and design for a new 180mm pipe to be installed using horizontal directional drilling.
“We acknowledge the ongoing disruption this fault has caused the Morton Avenue community.”
Using equipment such as suction trucks and bypass pumps was the only viable way to prevent repeated overflows into properties and the reserve while a permanent solution was designed and implemented.

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