The main burst at the bottom of the hill between Rothwell Road and Northfield Avenue in Kettering, but the problem has affected places as far as Broughton and Burton Latimer.

The roads immediately affected are Lower Street at the roundabout junction with the A6003 and the junction with Carlton Street.

An eyewitness said: "When I came in to work this morning at about 5.30am it looked like the water main had burst because water was shooting up about 2ft in the air.

"It was 3ft deep at one stage and was still flooded at about 7.30am."

No traffic can go down Lower Street past the Carlton Street junction and motorists cannot enter at the A6003 roundabout junction.

The incident started at around 4am this morning and firefighters, police and Anglian Water are still at the scene.

A spokesman from Anglian Water said they are not yet able to estimate the scale of the problem, but there are a lot of properties that have been affected as the water has spread to surrounding villages and in some places is 3ft deep.

He said the roads were finally opened in both directions at 9.30am.