The Eldorado Park Proper area has been besieged by electricity outages since the start of the New Year and residents are up in arms. Magdalene Solomons (56), a long-time Park Street resident who suffered from a respiratory disease, was reliant on life-sustaining breathing apparatuses to continue living.
Her family points to the portable breathing devices on her now empty bed and say that the recent outages are the cause of her recent death. Her sister-in-law, Marie Solomons (45) explains that Magdalene had one collapsed lung and her breathing was aided by artificial respirators which are powered by electricity.
Marie recalls nursing her sister-in-law through a 17 hour period of darkness on January 6 this year, adding that it was a miracle Magdalene did not succumb to a lack of oxygen at that time. The constant struggle would continue and the electricity would be cut off on January 11 from 5pm, leaving the breathing equipment without electricity, forcing the family to move Magdalene to a relative in Extension Seven.
The electricity would only be restored at around 5.15am the following morning, leaving the family uncertain whether there would be further outages. Marie opted to remain at home instead of going to work so that she would be able to assist her sister-in-law in that event.
Marie says, “We requested that an ambulance be sent and were informed that there were none available at the time.”
Councillor Peter Rafferty dispatched an aide to the Solomons residence following more outages and Magdalene was transported to the Fire station in Freedom Park where she received treatment for about half an hour, according to Marie. Thursday morning saw more power outages and the desperate family moved Magdalene to yet another relative in Kliptown.
Sadly, Magdalene’s battle would end at 6am, leaving the family questioning whether the loss of their loved one could have been avoided. In a telephonic conversation between the Eldorado Urban Reporter, and councillor Peter Rafferty, he recalls the incident, pointing to cable theft as the cause and urging residents to report perpetrators immediately as City Power are unable to police all thefts and tampering incidents.
Rafferty says, “This is indeed a sad situation and we would like to extend our sincerest condolences to the family for their loss.”
Meanwhile, the grief-stricken Solomons family feel that we are constantly being fed the ‘cable theft’ excuse while a large number of residents in Eldorado Park remain adversely affected by electricity outages.
A tearful Marie Solomons can be seen in the video below describing the circumstances which led to Magdalene’s death:
See also:
Eskom worried about illegal connections
