A Massive Blackout In Eastern Sydney Left Around 45K Customers In The Lurch

A huge power outage in Sydney‘s Eastern Suburbs left around 45,000 homes and businesses without electricity today, leaving some stuck in elevators, which is exactly where you don’t want to be in this weather.

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The heat – which is sitting at around 34, degrees Celsius at the time of writing, but could get as high as 38 later today – thought to be the cause of the blackout, but really, it was “a fault on an underground cable where it enters our Double Bay zone substation,” Ausgrid tweeted.

The outage hit at around 11:30am and affected customers across Randwick, Bondi Junction, Bondi, Kensington, Waverley, Double Bay, Woollahra, Bronte, Bellevue Hill, Clovelly, Coogee and Rose Bay. While being without aircon is more than enough of a pain in the ass, it also left people trapped in lifts and patients sitting in the dark at the Sydney Children’s Hospital.

https://twitter.com/MinxChique/status/1090783104178876416

According to the ABC, NSW Fire and Rescue crews were on hand to help those stuck in elevators out. The blackouts also caused havoc on the streets, with 23 traffic lights out across the area.

As you can see in the tweet below, a map of the affected areas really puts it all into perspective.

Yeah, that’s gonna be a yikes from me, folks. Luckily, the power provider was able to get things up and running relatively quickly, restoring 10,000 connections within about 45 minutes, and the rest about 30 minutes later, making the whole event a bit over an hour in length.

You’d hate to be stuck in a lift for more than five minutes, but it’s good to hear everyone’s safe now.

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