People's water supplies are returning to normal this lunchtime after botched repair work to a burst pipe caused havoc in the Dartford area.

Hundreds of people in parts of Bexley, Crayford, Dartford, Stone and Wilmington were left with either very low water pressure or no supply at all because of the problem, which stemmed from Thames Water's efforts to fix a burst 12-inch-wide pipe in Crayford Road.

The pipe, which runs inside a bridge above the railway line, burst on Tuesday afternoon and repairs were ongoing on Saturday night until a second burst on a joining pipe in the early hours of Sunday morning caused further disruption and flooding.

Although homes across the DA postcode have had their water restored, there is still major disruption to be found in Crayford.

The town's High Street and Tower Retail Park were submerged and Crayford Road has been closed at the junction of Station Road and Roman Way.

Road diversions are in place and no trains are running from Crayford station. Southeastern has tweeted that replacement buses are not serving Crayford because of the flooding - they would usually be available from the town's Sainsbury's store.

Sadia Farzana Chitra, 42, who lives in a flat in Townhall Square, which overlooks Crayford High Street and the Tower Retail Park, called kmfm on Sunday morning to say she was trapped in her home because of the flooding.

She said: “Everything is completely submerged. My car park is at the back of the block and that is totally underwater — about five or six cars are completely gone.

“It is very devastating. My car and my neighbour’s car, which is a van, are damaged and the firefighters took a picture of them for us and told me it could be a write-off.

“You do not know how much it could end up costing you. The road is also completely damaged and it is blocked.”

Cars in the onsite undercover car park are being crushed because of flooding, with the water having been soaked up by layers of polystyrene at the base of the ground floor.

Housing association Gallions and Peabody is responsible for the development and has been contacted for comment.

Thames Water senior operations manager Danny Leamon said: “This is an extremely difficult repair, due to the location and depth of the pipe, and we are very frustrated to have suffered this major setback.

“The second burst and flooding is now under control and water pressure should be returning to normal for customers.

“This is an extremely difficult repair, due to the location and depth of the pipe, and we are very frustrated to have suffered this major setback" Thames Water

"We’re really sorry for this added disruption our work is causing, and are doing everything possible to get things back to normal as quickly as possible.”

Bottled water is available in the Crayford Road area for anyone still without water or low pressure.

The list of postcodes originally affected was DA1, DA2, DA4, DA5, DA6, DA8, DA9, DA14, DA15, DA16, and SE9.