Anger over delayed power outage

Reports had it that “when Eskom completed maintenance work municipal workers were unable to use the switch to turn on the electricity as the batteries had run flat. And when a generator was brought in to charge the batteries it was discovered that there was no petrol – causing further delay by at least one hour.”

But this has been dismissed by Pieter Taljaard at the Steve Tshwete Municipality.

“The delays were because a fault on the Eskom side at the Aerorand substation when a breaker tripped. This was an Eskom fault,” Mr Taljaard emphasized. He confirmed that whilst most areas were back at 22:00, only a small portion of Aerorand was restored at 01:30.

He said that a separate problem was that demand was high when the Gholfsig substation was distributing power to different suburbs at 20:00.

“We had to switch on various areas through phases to deal with the high demand but this didn’t affect residents for a very long period of time,” he said.

“It doesn’t make sense that a generator had no petrol as technicians were using generators the entire day to work at the substations, so it’s readily available,” said Mr Taljaard.

Residents were furious at the delay as many had been waiting for electricity from 20:00.

Areas in Middelburg started coming on from before 20:00 including parts of Aerorand, Middelburg Central and Midlands Estate, followed by the industrial area and Eastdene at just a few minutes past 20:00.

But Kanonkop and Dennesig as well as portions of Aerorand remained off until 21:30. Dennesig was completely switched on by 21:40 while some residents in Aerorand reported no power until 01:30 the next day. Meanwhile, residents in Nasaret had electricity the entire day and were exempt from the planned outage.

Only a handful of home owners who reside in areas affected by the delay received the following message just after 20:00: Notice is hereby given that the scheduled time for restoration of electricity has been changed. Due to unforeseen circumstances the electricity will hopefully be switched on at 21:30. Sorry for the inconvenience caused.

Some had taken to Facebook to vent their anger. When someone asked if anyone had electricity at 21:30 the reply was: “No, but rather go sleep now. With any luck maybe tomorrow morning. To wait for power now is hopeless.”

• Eskom conducted work mostly at the new Aerorand substation along Mandela Drive, where a permanent power line was being installed to replace a temporary line. It was only recently approved following concerns regarding the conservation of a specific type of frog species that are found in the wet, marshy land in that area. Mr Taljaard stated that Eskom was pleased with the work done on the day and were completed with the specific project.