KZN cleans up after massive storm
2013-01-08 08:32
Nalini Naidoo, The Witness
Pietermaritzburg - A flash storm in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands
on Sunday afternoon, preceded by hurricane-like winds, caused major
infrastructural damage, with hundreds of electricity poles uprooted in various
suburbs.
Residents who have been without power since Sunday were
warned that it might be a while before their electricity is restored, given the
extent of the damage.
Late on Monday, authorities were unable to estimate when
power would be restored.
Fallen poles
The Witness learnt that teams of electricity workers were
combing the suburbs for fallen poles and snapped overhead wires to repair.
On Monday, parts of Prestbury, Pelham, the CBD, Hilton,
Montrose, Scottsville, Eastwood, Woodlands, Mountain Rise, Northdale and Masons
Mill were still without power.
The frustration for many residents was that they did not
have lights, but they could see that their neighbours had electricity.
In one street, every other house had lights. In another, the
houses downstairs had electricity but not those upstairs. And not all of Hilton
was plunged in darkness.
Municipal speaker Babu Baijoo said restoring the electricity
supply in the various areas was taking time because it was not whole suburbs
that had been affected, with one faulty substation that could be repaired.
He said private contractors had been brought in to help;
there were teams from Eskom as well as crews from other municipalities.
Baijoo said the municipality was not dealing only with the
electricity outages; its main priority throughout the day was helping more than
600 families across the city whose houses had been damaged in the storm.
He said there were families who had been left homeless and
whose furniture and other possessions had been damaged.
The storm cut a swathe of destruction through Howick,
Pietermaritzburg and uMshwathi (Wartburg).
Howick Municipality had to deal with fallen trees and
damaged houses, particularly in the informal settlements.
However, Mayor Mbali Myeni said the municipality was
fortunate in that the infrastructure had remained intact and the town had
power.
Water supply
uMshwathi suffered a similar fate as Msunduzi, with power
cables and telephones lines blown over, leaving the entire town without
electricity. The water supply was also disrupted after a pipeline to the Trust
Feed area was damaged.
Municipal manager Vincent Cebekhulu said Trust Feed was
without water for the entire day while the pipe was being fixed.
He said the municipal offices were being run on a generator
and no computers were working.
Cebekhulu said Telkom and Eskom technicians had worked for
the entire day and the municipality was told it was possible that power would
be restored by Tuesday.
Meanwhile, a major source of frustration for many
Pietermaritzburg and Hilton residents was not so much the power outages as the
fact that they could not get through to the municipality by phone.
Baijoo said city hall was also affected by the storm; some
telephone lines were down and rainwater pouring through a damaged ceiling had
damaged some computer servers.
None of the senior municipal managers were available on
Monday night.
Municipal manager Mxolisi Nkosi and the head of the
electricity department, Sabatha Nomnganga, were said to be “out in the field”.
Retired engineer Howard Richardson said he did not doubt
that the municipality was doing its best, but all residents wanted to know was
when their power would be restored.
When Hurricane Sandy hit the United States in mid-winter
last year, it took the authorities a week to get the power restored to some
parts.
- Were you there? Send us your eyewitness accounts and photos.
