Many parts of city witness 5-hour blackout after brief downpour
480 of 3,000 city feeders damaged due to gales
City power demand dipped from 4,000 MW to 1,000 MW in just half an hour
NAVEENA GHANATE
Aside from political recriminations about the ‘robustness’ of the power supply system before and after regime change in Telangana, it is now absolutely clear that one brief spell of rain with gales is all it takes to cripple power supply across the city, leave alone contiguous areas.
On Tuesday, following a brief spell of heavy rain accompanied by gales, most areas of Hyderabad witnessed a blackout for more than five hours. Many citizens complained all through the night that power supply, which had snapped initially at 4:30 pm, was not restored even after 4-5 hours.
As per officials, more than 480 of the 3,000 feeders across the city were damaged. By 10:30 pm nearly 300 of them were restored. Officials said by Tuesday night all feeders would be restored. Banjara Hills Circle faced longest power cut in all the 12 feeders from 4.30 pm or 5.30 pm.
City power demand dipped from 4,000 MW to 1,000 MW in just half an hour. More than the rain, gales and uprooted trees contributed to the bulk of the damage.
TSSPDCL CMD Musharaff Faruqui said that the second spell of rain around 8:00 pm hampered the restoration process because of which long power cuts were witnessed. According to officials, the issued flared up because on some very high tension wires, a lot of flexies had fallen. Besides, several uprooted trees were lying across roads.
Due to heavy traffic congestion caused by water-logging and slow movement of vehicles, the work of the emergency teams was delayed.
Officials claimed that a similar situation happened in 2021. However, citizens vented ire that even due to a brief spell of rain, almost the entire infrastructure Continued on Page 2
collapsed or became dysfunctional. Add insult to injury, lineman and AEEs were not picking calls at all.
Areas such as Boduppal, Boudhnagar, KPHB, Kukatpally, Madeenaguda, Kapra, Banjara Hills, Alwal, Bandlaguda, Himayathnagar and Chintal were in a mess following the blackout, with pillars broken, trees and branches lying across roads, and flexes strewn all over.
With the first spell of rain causing city-wide misery due to blackout and related mess, some of the netizens said that the Congress government should provide inverters.
A Arun Muthineni said, “Almost 5 hours of power cut in and around Mohan Nagar (Nagole Area). We are irritated with this. I think the Congress government should start providing invertors”.
Ajay, another consumer, said, “Power cut since 5.45 pm at Musarambagh ..
No response on the complaint numbers..Congress Govt .Thank you for the hardships .Let’s not vote for Congress on 13th for the troubles we are facing .It’s 9.20 pm now we all are helpless.”
A Kiran from Yellareddyguda said: “There’s been a power cut from the past 3 hours in the Yellareddyguda area, Hyderabad may be due to rain. But even after the rain stopped they didn’t give it”.
Another citizen at Film Nagar said, “We are facing power cuts in Veterinary Colony from evening 4:00pm. We have kids at home and it is really scary for them and all our power backups went to dead state”.
Another consumer Pramod said: “It has been 5 hours now and there is no power in Jagadgirigutta and most of the city. Do we need to sleep without power tonight? Dear CM Sir u said no power cuts but it’s NOT true.. .We seeing frequent cuts.”
