NSW: EnergyAustralia to take legal action against contractor

AAP General News (Australia)
04-29-2009
NSW: EnergyAustralia to take legal action against contractor

SYDNEY, April 29 AAP - EnergyAustralia will take legal action against the contractor
whose boring machine cut a vital power cable and caused Sydney's CBD to suffer its third
power blackout in a month.

Some 30,000 businesses and homes in northern parts of the city were without power on
Tuesday morning after workers in North Sydney drilled through the 132,000-volt cable.

That activated a safety shutdown, leaving parts of the city without power for 45 minutes.

EnergyAustralia said further investigations found the boring machine also damaged a
second cable, which was fixed overnight and back in service.

However, the first cable will take up to 10 weeks to repair.

EnergyAustralia managing director George Maltabarow said the company would now take
action to recover the costs associated with the damaged power cables.

"This incident is a reminder that there can be no short cuts when working near cables,
because the consequences are severe," Mr Maltabarow said in a statement on Wednesday.

"This contractor is extremely fortunate our protection equipment shut down the high-voltage
cable immediately because it probably saved his life."

Hundreds of office workers were evacuated during the power outage, while others were
stuck in lifts and 31 sets of traffic lights were blacked out.

At Circular Quay, the outage plunged a catwalk at Australian Fashion Week into darkness.

A blackout affecting some 70,000 homes and businesses in Sydney on March 31 crippled
the city during afternoon peak hour, and 50,000 customers in the same area were again
without power for about 90 minutes on April 4.

AAP nr/evt/jl/apm

KEYWORD: ELECTRICITY

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