A BURST water main has been causing chaos after it shut a busy main road in Newport for more than 24 hours. 

The A48 Chepstow Road in Newport was closed in the early hours of Sunday, August 4 while workers from Welsh Water were dispatched to repair the burst water main. 

The closure was between between Cats Ash Road and the roundabout close to Springs Health Club.

Both Gwent Police and South Wales Fire Service attended to assist, with fire crews on scene from 6.45am on Sunday to "assist with diverging the water". 

Newport Bus was also affected by the road closure, with many services being forced to take alternative routes, including routes 73 and 74A/C, which they reported on social media at around 8am on Monday, August 5. 

The road was closed all day on Sunday, and eventually re-opened to single lane traffic with temporary three-way traffic lights in place. 

It is understood that the temporary lights will be in place for a number of days to enable the "significant damage" to the road to be safely repaired. 

Residents saw their water restored around 8am on Monday, while some businesses were noticing a "substantially quieter" day on Monday as a result of the road closure. 

Resident John Holden said: "Welsh Water are using the contractor Morrison's to do this work. I noticed my water was back on at around 8am."

"They have done the repair and refilled part of the road but will have to come back on Wednesday to further the repair.

"Temporary three-way traffic lights have been installed to reopen one lane of traffic on the road. They said these will be here until Wednesday."

Welsh Water were able to confirm that the road had reopened with traffic management measures in place around 1pm on Monday afternoon. 

A spokesperson said: "The traffic lights are needed to allow the significant damage to the road to be safely repaired in coming days.

"Our crews have worked day and night to repair the burst main and minimise disruption to water supplies, which are now fully restored.

"We would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused and thank those in the area for bearing with us while we put this right."