Mystery as boats blocked by drained Wolverhampton canal

Various sections of Wolverhampton's 21 locks were drained with the section between Carvers and the Cannock Road bridge most severely depleted.

The water level was also significantly lower than usual between the Fox's Lane bridge and the viaduct near Wolverhampton Racecourse.

Engineers from the Canal and River Trust attended the affected canal on Monday after being alerted to the problem and refilled the drained sections.

But the trust was unable to say whether the canal had been drained maliciously or by accident.

Stephen Hardy, communications manager at the Canal and River Trust, said: "Sadly this type of incident isn't uncommon and our team are well versed in responding.

"We don't know the exact cause - it's most likely to be vandalism or a boater mistakenly leaving the sluices open. But given the time of year it's perhaps most likely to be the former.

"Our team went out and refilled the drained section by flushing water along the canal system. The canal was temporarily closed to boats while we restored the water levels.

"There were a few affected stretches of the Wolverhampton flight of locks – which again indicates that it was most likely to be vandalism."

Mr Hardy added there had been no reports of major environmental damage as a result of the canal being drained.

Wolverhampton's 21 locks form part of the Birmingham Canal Navigations Main Line running from near the railway station to Aldersley Junction where it joins the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal.

In June 2015 vandals drained the entire two-mile stretch by opening all 21 paddle locks and the canal had to be closed to boat traffic.

On that occasion the trust believed a specially made 'anti-vandal' key was used to open up the padlock gates which led to thousands of gallons of water draining off to adjacent land.