Power back on everywhere in Christchurch by Sunday

NZPA March 4, 2011, 5:54 pm

 

http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/top-stories/8954864/power-back-on-everywhere-in-christchurch-by-sunday/

 

Everyone in Christchurch should have the electricity back on by late Sunday, lines company Orion says.

The company said that by 2pm today it had achieved its target of restoring power to 95 percent of customers -- two days early.

Just 14,000 customers across the network were still to be connected. Eight thousand of those were in the Brighton and Dallington areas and surrounds, is including suburban Bexley, Bromley, Aranui, Avonside, and parts of Burwood and Shirley.

In such eastern suburbs, the number of customers without power had halved from 16,000 to 8000 in just 24 hours.

Orion added it expected to have reconnected most of the remaining 5 percent of customers without power by end of Sunday.

One setback today was the discovery of multiple cable failures leading out of Brighton substation which was now live, the company said.

Every cable failed and replacement was underway but the development was contributing to the slow process of customer reconnection in the eastern suburbs.