City Power working to resolve almost 2,000 outage backlogs in Joburg

City Power said it is working around the clock and will beef up the teams and resources to deal with almost 2,000 outage backlogs in the city of Johannesburg.

This comes after several of parts of Johannesburg plunged into darkness on Monday morning.

The power utility said there were about 1,990 outage calls from customers, with some of them over 24 hours.

“Hursthill depot accounted to most of the outages, with 650 calls coming from the area, followed by Lenasia and Roodepoort. The sore points are in Paarlshoop, Riverlea in Hursthill, Freedom Park, Eldorado Park, Vlakfontein, Trade Route Mall in Lenasia, Lindhaven, Witpoortjie in Roodepoort, Houghton, Bellevue, Bezuidenhout, Alexandra, Klipfontein, among others. “

City Power said most of the outages are due to the overloading of the network due to the high demand of electricity because of the rainy cold weather.

“Other factors contributing to the increase in outages include cable fault, equipment failure, and cable theft.  With persistent rain and inclement weather, most of the repair work was disrupted over the weekend leaving most outages unresolved.”

“We are however deploying more resources, technicians and operators to the problematic areas to help deal with the backlogs. We are also stocking up to ensure depots have sufficient material to deal with the outages. While the rain is still continuing, we are hoping to reduce most of the backlog by early afternoon,” City Power said.

City Power has urged customers to be patient as it deals with the backlog.

It has also called on customers to reduce the usage of electricity and switch off power guzzlers which could lead to the overloading of the network and equipment blowing up.

Meanwhile, Johannesburg Emergency Services Robert Mulaudzi has urged motorists to be cautious as the rain continues to persist.

“Most roads are wet and slippery. Motorists are urged to maintain a safe following distance and also try and avoid crossing flooded areas and low-lying bridges.”

Mulaudzi also cautioned residents in informal settlements.

“Avoid crossing river streams, monitor young kids to stay away from river streams so that we can be able to prevent drowning incidents.”

Mulaudzi said all emergency services will remain on high alert monitoring all seven areas of the City of Johannesburg urging residents to also be cautious when using heating devices to keep warm during the cold weather conditions in order to prevent any fire-related incidents in their homes.

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