Mini substation blows up in JHB resident’s face
A man was recently injured after allegedly trying to repair a faulty substation in Johannesburg.
A resident from Crosby near Mayfair in Johannesburg was recently hospitalised after a mini substation blew up in his face after he allegedly opened the mini substation and tried to operate it to restore electricity.
City Power in Johannesburg is now warning residents against opening substations and operating on the network as this is dangerous and illegal.
City Power’s spokesperson Isaac Mangena said the area had been without electricity since Wednesday after the mini substation tripped on a suspected overload.
“A call was logged with City Power, and the team was finishing at one site before they could attend to the tripped mini substation.”
“In a trail of WhatsApp Group messages from impatient residents, the victim was warned by the councillor and other residents against trying to operate on the City Power network. It would seem the victim went ahead and tried to operate when the substation blew up.”
“City Power operates in a highly regulated environment which prohibits unauthorised individuals from working on the electricity network.
“No resident is allowed to operate on the City Power network as this is not only illegal but dangerous, as is the case with the incident in Crosby.”
Mangena said City Power has a serious problem of vandalism of their infrastructure to an extent where residents illegally operate their network, often with the help of unqualified electricians, and connect themselves to the network or make illegal connections into the informal settlements.
“The area of Crosby is one of those with this problem where people in formalised houses illegally connect themselves, bypass meters, and illegal connections to Slovo informal settlement.
“This mini substation which blew up is brand new after we installed it a few weeks ago, and even our MMC Michael Sun visited the team working to connect it.
“We have, as City Power decided to report a case of vandalism and malicious damage to property against the victim as they were not supposed to go inside the substation yard and operate our infrastructure.”
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