HYDERABAD: The breach that occurred in the cofferdam — a watertight enclosure that is built to facilitate pumping out water around a spillway — at the gate No. 44 of the Sukkur Barrage on Thursday night could not be completely plugged till Saturday evening.

Reports from the site suggested that water was still flowing from the ruptured portion. The mishap has frustrated efforts by engineers and their workforce to start the process of dewatering, in order to dry up the floor in front of several gates.

The breach caused a deluge of water to make its way into the cofferdam area. The cofferdam was built to facilitate the ongoing work for the replacement of some barrage gates.

The project is funded by the World Bank and being executed by the Sindh Barrages Improvement Programme (SBIP) under supervision of foreign consultants. The World Bank has funded Guddu and Sukkur barrages’ modernisation projects by extending a loan of Rs74,618m.

Foreign consultants, engineers look into cause of mishap, continue sealing efforts for third consecutive day

The consultants are also looking into the cause of the breach.

Newly-appointed SBIP Project Director Noorul Arfeen Baloch, speaking to Dawn on Saturday over phone from Sukkur said that the breach occurred at around 11pm on March 4. “Although it could not be plugged till today, but I am sure we will be able to complete the job by tomorrow and start dewatering of the surface in front of barrage’s gates, which are to be replaced,” he said.

The affected cofferdam was built in October 2025 after flood season came to an end. Drying up the surface in front of the gates is meant to allow movement of heavy machinery and undertake engineering works for the gates’ replacement. Usually, polythene bags filled with soil are used to build the cofferdam to ensure mobility of workers and movement of machinery in the area.

The gates’ replacement process has been underway for the last few years at Sukkur Barrage. The floor of the barrage was dewatered last year but the Thursday night breach caused water to enter the area.

When breach occurred in front of gate number-44, around 33,000 cusecs of discharge was recorded at Sukkur barrage upstream. Currently downstream flows are being released with increased volume. On March 5 downstream flow was 11,000 cusecs and on Saturday the same was increased to 21,144 cusecs, so that dewatering could be undertaken easily.

A barrage official pointed out that 16 gates (Nos. 44 to 59) were replaced last year. The gate No. 36 was also replaced previously on a trial basis. So, technically 17 gates have been replaced so far. Now, 27 more gates are to be replaced this season, which started in October 2025 and would end in June this year i.e before the start of flood season.

These 27 gates bear serial numbers 15 to 43, excluding Nos. 23 and 36. The gate No. 23 is among the 10 permanently closed gates — Nos. 6 to 14 and No. 23). The gates No. 15 to 22 are considered to be ‘tail channel’ gates at the barrage.

The cofferdam was built in front of gate Nos. 24 to 46. The ongoing work of gates’ replacement is projected to be completed by the close of May and then machinery and other equipment would be removed from the site of the barrage.

According to Mr Arfeen, the project implementation consultants and a foreign dam safety expert would also be inspecting the site. “We have to first close the breach before starting dewatering of the surface so that we can achieve the target of replacement of 27 gates of the barrages by the close of May,” he said.

A reduction in flows are seen in the Rohri and Nara canals after water flows were released downstream from the barrage. The flows would show stability once the breach is plugged.

Published in Dawn, March 8th, 2026