Two City Power officials attached to the Midrand Service Delivery Centre were injured and rushed to the hospital when a substation blew up.
It is unclear which hospital they were rushed to or the extent of their burns and what may have triggered the explosion.
City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena said the cause of the explosion is being investigated.
This happened at the Allandale substation on May 15 when the team was busy with isolation for planned maintenance, which was scheduled from 08:00 until 16:00.
It left surrounding townships such as Rabie Ridge, Mayibuye, Commercia and others without power.
Mangena said, “Currently, the substation is isolated. We have requested the dry ice team to assist with the cleaning of the high-voltage panels. They are required to clean the carbon to enable City Power to assess the extent of the damages.”
Mangena said the protection team will then follow up to work on the panel wiring.
On May 16, he said the dry ice team had completed dry icing which is the removal of rubble and clearing of smoke in the affected substation.
“Our team is currently on-site stripping burnt panels. After stripping, we are going to assess the materials needed so that repairs can be initiated,” added Mangena.
City Power is expected to update its customers as and when new information becomes available.
The power utility’s Midrand Centre issued stated on May 15 that it had recorded 77 outages, 32 of which were recorded in the last 24 hours.
When the paper sought a comment from the Emergency Services’s Robert Muladzi, he referred the paper back to Mangena, saying, “In terms of the injuries, we can’t comment. We are no longer running ambulance services. It’s Gauteng Provincial Government now.”
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