PEAK-time traffic ground to a halt around Bury town centre as workers replacing water mains unearthed an unexpected problem.

Lane closures in Jubilee Way, Peel Way and Bolton Street caused rush hour chaos for teatime traffic heading in and out of Bury this week.

Disruption was widespread, with gridlock encompassing the whole of central Bury.

United Utilities, which is carrying out water mains replacement work, expect the delays to last for the next two weeks after a sewer pipe at Bury Bridge was found to have burst.

The discovery scuppered efforts to minimise disruption through a technique of underground "keyhole surgery".

The leak, which had been washing material from beneath the road, was noticed by workmen feeding plastic water delivery pipes through old cast iron mains under Bolton Street.

A United Utilities spokeswoman said: "Threading these pipes through the old mains means that we have to dig up less road and although the traffic disruption is bad, this does lessen it.

"Unfortunately, while we were working down there, our team of engineers saw that emergency work needed to be carried out.

"Where possible we try to carry out work out-of-hours, but the problem is that this has to be planned well in advance.

"This is not possible in the case of imperative emergency repairs."

Scheduled work to replace mains is due to move into Bolton Road after the Bury Bridge repairs are complete.

Ian Lord, Bury Council's engineering manager, said: "We weren't particularly happy about this work being done, but realised that it was essential.

"United Utilities actually wanted to carry it out three months ago, but agreed to wait until the summer holidays when traffic would be a little bit lighter."