WELLINGTON’S POWER SUPPLY

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 January 1939, Page 7

WELLINGTON’S POWER SUPPLY

ANOTHER SERIOUS FAILURE HUTT INDUSTRIES IDLED [PER PRESS ASSOCIATION.] WELLINGTON, January 20. Wellington’s black-out at. 0.20, lasting till 9.35, last night, was followed by’n far more serious one at 1.55 this morning, for not until midday was the voltage restored in the city. The load was taken over by the Evans Bay steam plant, so that apart from a few minutes, while the station was getting under way, and the city load was being sectionalised, there was little inconvenience, but the inconvenience in Hutt Valley was very serious indeed. The cause was again the shorting of the hundred and ten thousand volt power over the salt-encrusted surfaces of the insulators of the main transmission lines, from Shannon to Khandallah. A special force of Public Works linesmen from various parts of the Wellington area, added to by linesmen of the Hutt Valley Power Board, worked all day yesterday, cleaning salt crust from the insulators, on sixty odd miles of line, and are continuing today. A shower of rain would do the job in minutes, but there is no sign of rain. , ± Yesterday’s laborious pole and tower climbing and hand polishing covered twenty miles of one line only, and there are two lines over sixty miles long, but the salt crust is not bad over the whole length, The worst sections are apparently north of Paraparaumu. Some thousands of workers in the Hutt Valley were thrown idle, and nearly all industry was at a standstill this morning. Each of the large motor assembly plants are almost entirely dependent on electric supply, as well as Wills, Ltd., Slippers, Ltd.. Lever Bros., and many other industl In the railway workshops, the men were standing by cleaning machines and doing other odd tasks, but in the majority of the factories the employees lost time. The managers of several factories express the opinion that the question of a standby power for Hutt Valley should receive some consideration, hut it is recognised, just because of one failure, there is no need for panic, and a standby plant might not be an economic proposition. Heads of all factories all agree, however, it is the duty of the authorities to give the industries the earliest possible information regarding the probable length of failures. It is P oint ®“ out that in the case of war, standby plants would be essential as the destruction of hydro plants would bring all industry to a standstill. Some dislocation was caused to tne Wellington-Johnsonville electric train service. A limited supply of power was made available to railways from Evans Bay station, this morniQg, and it was found possible to operate the line, but at a considerably reduced speed. Extra ’buses were sent out to Johnsonville to assist passenger transport, but were not required. It is understood that the majority of the people reached the city in time foi work.