A water pipe violently exploded in central Thessaloniki early Sunday morning around 5 am during planned engineering works, injuring four employees of Thessaloniki Water Supply and Sewage Company (EYATH).
One worker was seriously injured when the pipe struck his leg, leaving him unable to stand. Witnesses said he tried to crawl away from the site to escape the force of the water. He was taken to the hospital with a fractured leg and is expected to undergo surgery. The rest sustained injuries of lesser severity.
Onlookers reported a high-pressure burst of water reaching up to the level of the street lamps, even propelling a garbage container considerably far away.
Speaking to the media, one eyewitness described the incident: “The corner of the pipe broke; it threw one person down, the other it threw into the hole, and it hit another poor guy. I was afraid that the one who fell in wouldn’t get out again, with so much water shooting out and the pressure there. It’s a miracle that he managed, all by himself, to pull himself out and get out.”
A significant amount of water was released out onto the street during the incident. The local authorities shut off the area surrounding the incident so that they could attend to the situation and clear the damage.
