New season—new failure

A NEW boating season starts and the Kennet & Avon gets its first failure—the pumps at Crofton supplying water to the summit pound.

Last year narrowboatworld recorded three failure of these pumps with corresponding three stoppages due to lack of water, and once again, the canal is closed to navigation due to their failure, Keith Gudgin tells us.

No gravitational flow

The pumps at Crofton Pump House take water from below Lock 60 and pump it to the summit pound, as the summit has no gravitational flow into it, relying solely on the pumps at Crofton, so when they fail, as they obviously do, lack of water causes the closure of the navigation.