NSW: Power company apologies for another major Sydney blackout
04 Apr 2009 2:33 PM
SYDNEY, April 4 AAP - Power company EnergyAustralia has apologised for the second major disruption to Sydney's power supply this week, with about 50,000 homes and businesses affected.
Properties in the northern part of the city, along with parts of eastern and inner city suburbs, were blacked out at 10.28am (AEDT) on Saturday.
Emergency services were called to people trapped in lifts, the harbour tunnel was closed and traffic lights were blacked out.
EnergyAustralia staff re-routed power into the city from other parts of the network, and service was restored to all areas in just over an hour, EnergyAustralia said in a statement.
"The fault occurred in a substation in the CBD while essential fire protection work was being carried out," it said.
"While that work was taking place, a fault occurred on a transformer and it was immediately shut down and withdrawn from service by our automatic protection equipment.
"As a result of the transformer fault, the three major cables that supply this part of the city also shut down. A fourth cable is out of service following Monday's interruption."
On Monday, 70,000 homes and businesses were plunged into darkness, causing peak-hour chaos, closing major road links, and leaving people stranded in lifts.
Some 140 sets of traffic lights were blacked out, with police directing traffic at 40 of them.
Power was restored within two hours, but not before the Roads and Traffic Authority (RTA) was forced to close two of the busiest roads out of the city - the Harbour Tunnel and Eastern Distributor - around 5.45pm (AEDT).
On Saturday, the eastern suburbs had power reconnected at 11.37am, the Surry Hills area was reconnected at 11.39am, and power was restored to the northern part of the CBD at 11.45am, EnergyAustralia said.
"EnergyAustralia is deeply sorry for this incident and we apologise to the community and to emergency service crews who were inconvenienced for the second time this week.
"This interruption is unacceptable and we are carrying out a full investigation so we can do everything possible to prevent it from happening again.
"The city continues to have full supply and we will be working around the clock to strengthen it further over the weekend."
