MORE than 100 homes were left without heating in Marsden yesterday – as temperatures dropped to -6ºC in some areas.

Gas engineers worked for hours to try and locate the problems, caused when water seeped into gas pipes.

And Kirklees Council set up an emergency centre in the village to try and help residents.

The problems began on Tuesday evening when Janet Maude, of Carr Street, was out walking her dogs near Rose Hill Park.

She said: “There was a really strong smell of gas so I rang it through as an emergency. Engineers were here within 30 minutes.

“Strangely enough, six or so years ago I did exactly the same thing then.”

A full-scale emergency operation to care for the vulnerable, including a 90-year-old Alzheimer’s sufferer, swung into action at the Mechanics Institute where senior engineers and council staff organised help in a specially convened operations room.

Among them were Sean Westerby, the council’s corporate safety and resilience team manager and Jason Shirazi, principal emergency planning officer.

Sean said: “One hundred and twenty-five properties were without gas from 7pm after water has got into the gas mains so they are having to purge the system.

“Our main concern is with vulnerable people. The wellbeing integration team are going out knocking on doors and checking that people are all right.”

Kirklees mayor David Ridgway, who represents Marsden, called in to the institute yesterday morning to check on progress.

He said: “The first thing I would like to say is that I am very pleased that engineers were here so quickly. It’s really important that any breakage or leakage can be put right immediately.”

A spokeswoman from Northern Gas Networks said yesterday lunchtime: “Our engineers have found the leak and are reconnecting vulnerable customers to the gas supply this afternoon.

“They will be working around the clock to get the remaining customers reconnected as soon as possible.”

Engineers began visiting the affected properties yesterday morning to safely isolate gas supplies and were also working to pump water out of the system.

The streets affected were: Carrs Road, Carrs Sidestreet 1 and 2 , Meltham Road, Woods Avenue and Woods Terrace.

Northern Gas Networks and Kirklees Council set up a customer drop-in centre at the Mechanics Institute in Peel Street where residents received up-to-date information about the incident as well as hot refreshments.

And the council was busy identifying any vulnerable people who might need extra support during the disruption.