Brent Cross has been brought to a standstill after a burst water main left the North Circular Road under several feet of water.

Traffic is queuing in both directions for up to five miles due to the flooding under the Brent Cross Flyover.

Water supplies in the area are believed to be affected and the road is expected to be closed in both directions for some time.

The Metropolitan Police has ten units at the scene and officers have reported seeing a 15ft diameter hole in two lanes caused by the flooding.

Motorists have been left stranded in the heavy traffic, while commuters have been unable to board public transport.

Jonathan Samuel arrived at his bus stop at 7.55am to find “a huge lake of water”.

The senior software engineer said: “It was quite spectacular. People were taking photos, there were police and ambulances on site within about five to ten minutes.

“A young lady who had been waiting at the bus stop told me that when she arrived everything was fine. Then five minutes later the whole area was flooded. 

“By the time the bus to Hemel Hempstead and Luton arrived at 8am, the North Circular was under about two or three feet of water west bound and the flooding was spreading to the east bound carriage and the Tesco service road.  It must have been a very big water main burst.

“We managed to flag down another bus before it got to the A406 junction and got caught in the traffic mess. We made it through ok via the Tesco slip road and onto the M1, though we had to leave some unfortunate passengers behind who usually board the buses at Brent Cross.”

Motorists caught in the tailbacks have taken to Twitter to air their misery.

Bredda tweeted: “Avoid the A406 at Brent Cross like the plague unless you like sitting in traffic.”

Thames Water confirmed its engineers are working to fix the problem.

A spokesperson said in a statement: "A large water main burst this morning at Edgware Road's junction with Claremont Road.

"Our engineers are currently on the scene working to turn off the water running through the broken section of pipe before they dig it up and replace it.


"We are really sorry for the disruption. We are working as hard as we can to get things back to normal."