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Furious residents have kicked up a stink after a burst pipe sent a river of sewage gushing into their gardens in Seasalter.
Residents in Lucerne Drive described how they woke up yesterday to find more than a foot of sewage seeping through their gardens after a split in the sewer rising main.
The sewage has caused thousands of pounds of damage, with children forced to remain indoors rather than play outside.
Householder Stacy Watkins said: "At first I thought it may have just been rain water, but then I came back 10 minutes later and my garden was filling up with water.
"At first it was rainwater, but then raw sewage just started pouring in my garden.
"This has cost thousands of pounds worth of damage. All the fences need to be replaced and my children's bikes, playhouses and scooters were all destroyed.
"When I asked about whether we will be compensated I was told it could take up to a couple of years.
"They also said if anything else needed to be cleaned up then we would have to do it ourselves. They haven't done a good job at all."
Her neighbour Terry Johncock said the devastation has left the estate looking like a third world village.
Mr Johncock said: "It looked like an African mudslide - it was just a river of dirty water.
"Normally the kids would all be outside playing especially in the holidays, but they have to stay indoors."
Southern Water spokesman Maria Harrison apologised for the flooding, adding urgent investigations to find the cause are being carried out.
She said: "This is a major burst and requires a complex repair.
"We are doing all we can to carry out repairs as soon as possible and this requires the use of tankers to transport the wastewater while the sewer is being repaired.
"We know tankers are noisy and we'd like to apologise for any disturbance.
"However, during incidents like this, they're necessary in ensuring that customers are able to do things like flush toilets and use washing machines while the repair is being made.
"Our contractors have started the clean-up of the areas affected by this incident and we will be looking into why this happened.
"We understand that there were a total of 16 properties with flooded gardens as a result of the rising main burst.
"Once again we'd like to apologise for the problems caused to our customers."
