Blackouts hit North Trinidad

SEVERAL AREAS in North Trinidad were plunged into darkness over the last 24 hours and many of those areas remained without electricity yesterday as the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (TTEC) sought to get to the root of the problem.

Among the areas affected by the mysterious blackout were Diego Martin, Westmoorings, Carenage, Chaguaramas, Goodwood Park, Maraval, Cascade and St James.

Calls from residents of the affected areas to Newsday yesterday indicated that power outages occurred twice on Monday evening and once more yesterday morning. Many of the affected areas, according to residents, were without power between the hours of 4 pm to 8 pm on Monday and 10.30 am to 2.30 pm yesterday.

One Diego Martin resident described the situation as unacceptable given the fact that a scheduled power outage took place last Friday from 8.30 am to 2.30 pm.

In a statement yesterday, TTEC said following the disruption of power to customers in parts of North Trinidad, another “unanticipated problem” occurred at 10 am yesterday and affected almost all of those areas.

TTEC said it was advised by PowerGen that its Port-of-Spain Generation Number Four had tripped, resulting in load shedding in the outer west ring of TTEC’s north sub-transmission system.

TTEC said restoration work was continuing apace, but it could take two hours to restore power to the affected areas and it apologised to all affected consumers. The Commission also urged all consumers to conserve electricity in order to ensure some support of efforts to restore a supply to customers who are now adversely affected.

Contacted yesterday, TTEC corporate communications manager Dennis McComie told Newsday that power had been restored in some of the affected areas in north Trinidad, and TTEC was still trying to identify the cause of the blackouts.