A BURST fire hydrant caused chaos in an Ipswich street today, spurting gallons of water onto the road.

A BURST fire hydrant caused chaos in an Ipswich street today, spurting gallons of water onto the road.

Queues of traffic built up on either side of Felixstowe Road as water shot out of the fractured pipe 12 ft into the air like a fountain.

As the water gushed out onto the street passers-by looked in disbelief and Anglian Water arrived on scene to tackle the problem.

It is thought that the fire hydrant was knocked by contractors carrying out work outside a new supermarket being built.

Derek Morton, proprietor of Tiles and Tiling on Felixstowe Road, said: "It is a real problem. It has been going for about 30 minutes. We have had no customers coming into the store because of the resurfacing work which has gone on since this morning."

The water was turned off about 30 minutes after the pipe was damaged. The incident began around midday.