Blinkpan resident, Fanie Grobler, told www.mobserver.co.za that the fire at the substation was possibly malicious vandalism from organised criminals who set fire to drained transformer oil, after completely stripping the substation during a weekend-long raid.

The residential area was plunged into darkness in the early hours of Friday morning, after a copper syndicate of over 80 armed criminals stormed the Goedehoop plant, before moving on to the substation which is located on the premises.

After sitting without electricity, Mr Grobler who lives nearby the substation, drove to the site to find out what the issue was.

Upon his arrival, Mr Grobler was met with an army of SAPS members in armed vehicles as well as reaction officers from Coin Security.

After asking around, security officers told him that a group of 80 armed copper thieves were on the plant, stripping both the plant and substation of materials.

Three police vans were already full of arrested criminals but police could not gain access to the plant due to armed retaliation.

The SAPS managed to gain control of the situation and by 17:00 that Friday afternoon, the scene was calm and under strong police surveillance.

Mr Grobler returned Saturday morning to find the substation crawling with authorities and technicians from Eskom, who were hoping to restore power by that afternoon.

After yet another night without electricity, Mr Grobler paid another visit to the substation where he found one technician sitting at the site eating lunch. Upon inquiry, an Eskom representative informed him that the syndicate had returned on Saturday night and stripped the station of everything that was repaired, leaving the substation in worse condition than the very first raid.

He was still seated in his bakkie when a group of criminals came chasing down on the site in a vehicle ready for their next spree. When the group saw the police, they hastily fled the scene.

By Monday, a reaction officer had told Mr Grobler that they had made over 70 arrests and confiscated three vehicles containing copper, but the criminals kept coming.

Eskom released a communique stating that due to the recurring vandalism, both the Goedehoop and Export substations have been declared high-risk areas and that repair teams have been withdrawn for their own safety.

While communications are underway with both the Provincial Joint Operational Centre and National Joint Operational Centre to stabilise the environments, the unplanned outages will continue without estimated restoration time until the network can be restored.

The areas affected include Blinkpan, Koornfontein, Komati rural, Dorsfontein and Middelkraal.

•It was reliably learned that Eskom has written off the Blinkpan substation due to the high level of recurring vandalism and that talks of a new substation have surfaced.

The building of a new substation will take months and the possibility of temporarily redirecting electricity from other areas is the current solution being unofficially offered.

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