A REWARD is likely to be offered for information leading to an arrest after vandals caused more than $1 million damage to the Orange to Carcoar pipeline.
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Plastic sewer pipes in stockpiles between Forest and Huntley roads have had holes drilled in them, which if laid would cause them to leak.
The steel pipes used to transfer the water though have been unaffected, although the machinery used has also recently been the target of vandals and saboteurs.
Orange Council project manager John Marshall said a $200,000 excavator had been burnt out and $50,000 in damage had been done to a Vermeer trenching machine through fire and rocks in its hydraulics, while a perpetrator had rammed a loader into a grader, costing another $285,000.
The Orange to Carcoar pipeline, built in partnership between Orange City Council and Central Tablelands Water, has been under construction since April and has recently crossed into the Blayney shire.
The sewer lines around Spring Hill and the airport are being laid by the contractors for Orange Council in the same trenches as the water pipeline.
They are not part of the $21 million water pipeline contract.
Central Tablelands Water General Manager Gavin Rhodes said that the water pipeline was not damaged and work would continue on towards the Carcoar water treatment plant.
“The sewer pipes are a plastic PVC pipe where the water pipes are a ductile iron and much more rigid,” he said.
“The damage has only been to the sewer lines and it hasn’t affected the water pipelines.”
Mr Rhodes said that the project was now almost halfway finished.
“There are two crews and they’re now up to forty per cent complete,” he said.