The Comisión Estatal de Servicios Públicos de Tijuana (CESPT), the state water utility, shut off water to roughly 30 neighborhoods across Tijuana and Playas de Rosarito on Monday afternoon after detecting a leak in the Reverse Flow Aqueduct. The partial closure began at 4:00 p.m. on April 27 and is expected to last until noon on Tuesday, April 28.
CESPT identified the problem on the PB7 pumping line of the aqueduct. Emergency repair crews were dispatched to fix the leak, which required a partial shutdown of the pipeline. The utility warned that even after repairs are completed, gradual service restoration could take additional hours beyond the noon Tuesday target, particularly for neighborhoods at higher elevations or farther from main distribution lines.
Which Neighborhoods Are Affected
Nine colonias in Tijuana lost service, including Puerta Plata, Natura, and Emiliano Zapata. The shutdown also hit 21 neighborhoods in Playas de Rosarito. Some areas in Ensenada supplied by the same aqueduct line were also affected, though CESPT did not specify which ones.
The southeast zone of Tijuana bore the brunt of the outage. Residents in affected areas were advised to store water immediately and limit consumption once service returns to help the system recover pressure across all connected neighborhoods.
A Recurring Problem for the Region
Aqueduct leaks and emergency shutoffs are a familiar ordeal for Tijuana and Rosarito residents. The Reverse Flow Aqueduct has required similar emergency repairs in the past, including an incident in 2025 when a leak near the Piedras Blancas subdivision cut water to 41 neighborhoods in the same region. In 2022, maintenance on the Florido-Aguaje aqueduct left more than 900 neighborhoods, roughly 1.6 million people, without service for 24 hours.
More than 90% of Tijuana’s water originates from the Colorado River. It travels west across Baja California and over a 4,000-foot mountain pass through a single aqueduct system that is aging and frequently in need of repair. The city’s rapid growth in recent decades has put increasing strain on infrastructure that was not designed for its current population.
CESPT urged residents to monitor its official social media channels for real-time updates on the repair timeline. This story was first reported by Punto Norte.