'Thick, orange water' safe to drink, woman told

Residents in the Hobart suburb of Sandy Bay say thick, orange water spurted from their taps on Tuesday after a water main burst.

One resident says TasWater told her the "thick and viscous" liquid was fine to drink.

TasWater says it is investing in infrastructure upgrades.

When Hobart resident Emma Thornley put a load of whites in her washing machine on Tuesday morning, she was not expecting it to come out covered in dark-orange stains.

"I ran to my kitchen tap, and [the water] was very dark browny-orange," she said.

Ms Thornley let the water run for a while, which cleared it, but a few hours later she filled up the kettle straight under the tap.

"I didn't watch the water going into it, which in hindsight was a bit silly, and then realised that the water in my cup of tea was really gritty and had a really foul taste," she said.

It persisted on and off throughout the day.

The culprit was a 60-year-old burst water main on Regent Street, Sandy Bay, near Ms Thornley's house.

Water issues are not uncommon in her Hobart suburb.

"I think I've had about eight text messages [from utility TasWater] to alert me that the water quality would be affected or it might be cloudy or discoloured while they were doing work, but we usually get those texts in advance or ASAP when there's an issue," she said.

Ms Thornley tried to report Tuesday's issue over the phone but was told the water was fine to drink.

She took a bottle of the orange liquid to show the TasWater crew on her street, who advised her not to drink it.

"I don't want to drink it and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't either."

Glen Christensen also had issues with his water on Tuesday, despite living about 2 kilometres from the emergency works.

He said he was trying to run a bath for his two-year-old granddaughter, but the water that came out was dirty with sediment.

"The first time I called [TasWater], I was told to run the tap closest to the meter, which is my outdoor tap," Mr Christensen said.

He followed the advice, but it did not help.

"We ended up resorting to a shower, at least that way she wouldn't be sitting in it, and whilst the shower was running there was a significant drop in water pressure, after that the water came clear," he said.

Another resident commenting on social media also reported bath water running "brownish" in the evening.

TasWater said its crews responded to the burst water main at about 9.45am and had restored supply to the majority of affected properties by 11.30am, with all properties restored by 5.30pm.

Australia's national drinking water guidelines state that water should be aesthetically pleasing and pleasant to drink.

"Many customers equate aesthetics with the safety of drinking water, so every effort should be made to meet the aesthetic guideline values," it states.

TasWater's head of communications and engagement, Liz Hafner, said it was not uncommon for sediment to settle in pipes after an outage, and that crews routinely flush pipes once water has been restored to clear it.

"Our initial advice provided to the customer was that the water was safe to drink [which] reflected the information available at the time," she said.

"Once we became aware from the customer of the level of discolouration, we updated our advice and carried out further flushing."

Some affected customers received text messages from TasWater, and the utility said it provided live updates on its website throughout the service interruption.

Ms Hafner said the incident highlighted the importance of continued investment in upgrading critical infrastructure.

"Over the next four years, we will invest $1.2 billion in essential infrastructure across Tasmania."