Islands in darkness as cable link goes down
Tuesday 27th September 2011, 9:36AM BST.
Although the French cable link power was restored this morning, Guernsey Electricity's gas turbines and diesel engines were kept running while investigations continued into the cause of the fault.
GUERNSEY and Jersey were plunged into darkness last night when the French cable link went down.
In the first major power cut for many years the electricity cut out just before 7.30pm.
Some parishes, including Vale and Castel, were back on within 15 minutes, but many people had to wait much longer.
Central St Peter Port was in darkness for just over an hour, although power was restored to other parts of Town within 30 minutes.
St Peter’s and the Forest were in darkness for about an hour-and-a-half, but some islanders were without power for as long as three hours.
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This will probably be used as justification for another price hike
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It was hideous….a whole half hour of chatting to the family? Where do I complain?
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Refreshing to see another French shambles for a change …..
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Half hour? more like an hour and a half! and one of the most inconvenient times. I take it they won’t be putting up their prices now? I thought we were on the French grid with our own powerstation as a back up? So why did they both go down? What king of michey mouse operation are they running? cowboys.
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I thought it was perfect timing myself.
Tea had just cooked in the oven, me and the missus had just sat down to eat when the lights went out. One lit candle later and a romantic dinner for two!
Took much longer for the internet to come back on, no mention of that anywhere I see!!
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Is that why I lost my TV signal a coupe of times? Does it still relay from Jersey to Alderney?
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I suppose a average of an half hour down time a year isn’t too bad, and I for one would object to the cost of keeping the power station here running at a capasity to kick in instantaniously as that would surely cost a great bit more in gas / oil and make the cost and environmental saving of nuclear null.
For me it was fifteen minutes of something interesting and I wouldn’t regard it as too much of an inconvinience.
However, it does make me question the integrity of the current infrastructure, and I expect a full enquiry as to why it happened to be conducted, and if it is deemed to be a potential threat in the future a more efficient backup should probably be devised.
Aside from all that, it is good to see there were no problems with potentially disasterous consiquences with such services as the hospital and the airport going down.
Maybe we should all just take this on the chin and spend a fiver on a few torces / batteries to but around the house.
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Neil,
Worse than that – I had to talk to real friends instead of using Facebook!
Still, could have been worse: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_Blackout_of_2003
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SS
And the last power cut that you can remember was when exactly?
People should be grateful they have such a reliable service. You people should live on Sark for a while. You’d soon realise how good you have got it.
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I have to say, showering by torchlight was a strangely relaxing experience. Until it came to getting dressed afterwards, when I couldn’t hold the torch AND put my socks on the right way.
Didn’t much appreciate having to wait til 9.30 for my dinner either. Still, this is the fourth or fifth power cut we’ve had in my neck of the woods this year, so I’m getting used to it.
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just phoned up the electric to see if my hot water timers would have been affected, and they said yes, having suffered a brain injury i find it hard to follow technical instructions, i was told there would be a charge for a electrian to come and ajust my settings, obcene never mind
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@ss
unfortunately it takes a long time to start up the bigger generators, we can’t afford to run them permanently just in case the link fails.
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We have had a very reliable service since the cable link was installed. Twenty years ago there is no way half an hour without power would have made the front page since it used to occur on an almost weekly basis.
As for the length of time it took to restore power, I assume it is not as easy to start a large diesel generator as it is to start your car. Lets be thankful we still have the capacity to generate on island if necessary. If we didn’t you may have had to make conversation all evening.
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I agree that we haven’t had as many power cuts in recent times as we used to have pre France days when it seemed to be once a week.
However, Guernsey Electricity have a definite need for a PR department which will kick in when the electricity goes down and are available to answer calls from frustrated islanders needing to know when they can expect the power to go back on. There is only one number available and even when you get it to ring the call is “disconnected” by somebody “bright spark” at Guernsey Electricity.
While we all know (and don’t we?) that Guernsey Electricity are the only provider on the island that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have the courtesy to provide some sort of incident room to deal with their customers – not ignore them. I’m sure it wouldn’t take too much to have staff on a call in basis to man a couple of phones when a power cut kicks in.
Come on Guernsey Electricity – play the game. You’re quick to increase your prices whenever the wind changes direction so this service is the least we can expect.
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Geezerboy
I cant say I’m an expert in hot water timers, but if you need any help resetting them please ask the moderators to provide you with my email address and I’ll do what I can.
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Another guernsey shambles
just wait u8ntil france has the same issues as greece
PEEPS some advice buy candles now
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I would like to know where the GP got there info regarding power being out for only 15 minutes in the Castel one and a half hours was what it was in my area.
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Jojm, it was only out for about 15-20 minutes where I was (in Castel). I guess the grid borders don’t follow parish borders exactly!
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The outage was caused by a Solar Storm. It hit the earth in the early evening. Kp was up to 8 (max 9). As the sun’s activity hots up we can expect more coronal mass ejections, if one hits the earth head on expect more. As it was yesterday’s CME was a glancing blow.
Solar Storms are magnetic in nature and induce fields in power grids. Whilst our cables to France and here are underground and to a certain extent protected, overhead power transmission is the norm elsewhere and in France.
Expect more – during the last solar max we had no cable to France !
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Cant believe the fuss this has caused. Try living in Canada where after snow storms in the winter they had no electricity for about 3 days and temperature in the region of minus 20!! We had an hour or so of inconvienence for the first time in ages, big deal.
The worst problem last night caused was the traffic lights not working but as long as it was treated as a filter in turn it was ok.
@ Neil and Chrisj ,brilliant you both made me laugh!!
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I think the more pressing issue that you are all missing here is the fact that with no telephone’s working and internet access down what would we do if a french Nuclear reactor knocked out all the electricity? With those air raid sirens now defunct I guess we must all fend for ourselves since the home dept decided we don’t need them as we have mobile phones. My phone wouldn’t ring anyone for a good while. Get your candles and your necessities to last a few days.
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Power was out in the South West for about an hour and a half. I understood that GE had low speed and high speed generators, one taking some time to fire up, the other being fairly quick, this could be the cdase if some areas were back on fairly quickly,although I would have thought high speed generators should have been online within a couple of minutes.
As to the cause, well that is still an open book but one possibility may be Geomagnetic radiation. The following copied from a friends post on an internet forum.
“If there are any parts of the grid sufficiently long to require a large voltage (>700kV) then they are apparently susceptible to geomagnetically induced currents. The nearly DC nature of these currents cause the transformer to overheat and circuit protection measures will activate.
The Finnish Meteorological Institute operate GIC Now! with other institutions under the umbrella of the ESA Space Weather Pilot Project. Results from yesterday indicate that there were significant spikes in GIC (first attachment) and also that the distribution of effects across Finland varied significantly (second attachment, magnetometer plots). Perhaps the extent of the charging and the forcing of the auroral zone down to lower latitudes created the perfect environment for a large enough GIC to be generated – but only causing problems on long enough sections of the grid? Maybe also due to how sharply defined the induction zone was, as noted on the Finnish magnetometers (couldn’t find a map for spatial distribution of those sorry).”
PS I haven’t included the graphics.
Paul D
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St Sampsons were out for 14 minutes according to the log on my UPS
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I was actually mildly disappointed when the power came on as it interrupted a candlelit romantic evening in front of a nice open fire with my wife.
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Thankfully for me, my electrics were only out for about 15 mins, but I had my stash of tea light candles to hand. I was amazed though, looking on facebook, how many friends were moaning that they couldn’t find a torch, had to light their ‘display purpose’ / posh candles, etc. It really amazes me that people are not prepared for these things!
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We were 100% back on the French link from around 11pm last night so the ‘greens’ can now sleep easily in their bed provided they don’t mind the cheery green glow coming off the French nuclear stations, :-)
As one poster mentioned earlier, nothing seems to have been said about Cable and Wireless and their internet DNS going down? I had backup power but the internet was definitely down during the cut and for a considerable time afterwards. And how about the mobile phone network? Maybe I just happened to be in a blackspot when the power went off but I couldn’t get calls through on Wave and a collegue was similarly unable to get calls through on C&W. Perhaps the operators can confirm that the majority of the base stations went dead and just a small select number remained up with backup power? We should be told the contingency plans for each network so we can make a valid choice of provider.
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The argument of not being able to call someone during a power outage doesn’t translate to disasters, the normal routing of trafic will go through servers which calculate time and the appropriate billing and ballance info and what not, an emergency system would be a simple script on the cell tower side that should broadcast on all registered devices.
So, if C&W have their act together we should be fine.
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Paul Le Page
Simply get up and switch the lights back off to relieve your mild disappointment. A, what you would term, non story.
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Baby boom in nine months from now…
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Bet the thieves had a ball….
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THE MAN, thanks for that mate got a electrian around,£25.00, never mind, but thanks very muc h for you offer
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Disgruntled
Why would you need to phone them. They are obviuosly aware of the situation and are doing their best to sort it out. If nobody phoned them I am sure they would probably get it sorted quicker.
It amazes me how people cannot cope without electricity for an hour or so once in a blue moon.
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Lisa
I completely agree.
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Truth Man – now why didn’t I think of that!
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Paul Le Page
I am really worried about you and your wife, as at the time of the power cut my husband and I were walking along the headland at Bordeaux in shorts and tshirts and believe me I am a cold mortal,complaining and remarking on the heat, only for you to say you were in front of a nice open fire, well I hope you have enough coal in stock,for what is supposed to be a very cold winter. But I am glad you enjoyed you meal, non the less.
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Power cut, big deal it happens, get over it, chill out a little.
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Another power cut tonight – are we living in a third world country ?
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Now Wednesday night and it’s just gone off again! Then came back on, but then the tv signal went off. Now it’s back.
It’s like living in a 3rd world country!
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I don’t see what the big deal is. I wasn’t surprised to see it as a headline though, all people seem to do here is moan about petty things. So what if you were sat in the dark for an hour or however long it was, it’s not the end of the world.
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So it’s happened twice last night again!
I hope that Guernsey Electricity compensate their customers by discounting the next bill!
As Pea Brain Falla would say – another Guernsey shambles!
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Interesting note re. solar storm.
At some point I was going to build an “Earth Field Monitor” which measures magnetic field spikes and displays them.
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I hope we get another one tonight, was nice to be able to see the stars so clearly in Town – normally it’s impossible because of light pollution.
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Valeite – you can rest easy sir, the fire was there for it’s visual rather than thermal qualities.
Still, with all this cold weather I might get the thermal undies out! ;-)
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Sorry valeite – should have been ma’dam. This cold weather is messing with my brain.
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eggy bread
I was thinking something along those lines myself last night. Then it struck me – these power outages are a conspiracy. Somebody at GE is jealous of Sark’s ‘dark sky island’ status and is gunning for Guernsey to join that most exclusive of clubs!
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DISGRUNTELED I Think you were not the only purson phoning the emergency line proberbly 30% of the island were and i cant see them having the staff to answer every call and they have more important things to contend with than customers calls. GE in my eyes have a very reliable service and the black out which was caused was the french power fault nothing to do with Guernsey, well done Guernsey Electricity for doing such a good job getting us back on as soon as you did.
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Gawd some of you crack me up – 3rd world country!!!?? When you sit in your armchair tonight with all your home comforts and the electric goes out for – shock horror – 15 minutes – think how pathetic you sound. Blaming Guernsey Electricity for a french fault is typical Guernsey style, moan groan. (And yes I am a guernsey girl!!)
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If a geomagnetic storm does hit the grid you’ll all be wishing you were prepared for a lot longer than 15 minutes!! Not just candles, tinned food and water…
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LOL – “Third world country” – some of you people need to sort your life out if having no electricity for a short period of time constitutes as living in a “third world country”. That’s just an insult to those who have to suffer with the effects of a real third world country lifestyle, and it only highlights some pretty ignorant and typical British creature-comfort, materialistic attitudes – I personally would love to live for a little while without the soulless stresses of modern life and some of the things electricity brings us ;). Obviously it’s unideal but it’s not the end of the world, and if you can’t find a way to amuse yourself or cope with the few minutes of darkness, then you really need to take a hard look at yourself in the mirror. I totally appreciate why it’s an inconvenience to some people like geezerboy, and hope that everything has been solved for people in his situation or similar (and I agree that charging for the help is unkind and a bad move, IMO), but at the same token, there are also many others that have no reason to complain as much as I’ve heard them, on and off of this forum…
Those of us that haven’t come to Guernsey for tax, finance or job reasons might remember a time when power cuts were a lot more common, perhaps that could explain the difference in attitudes.
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RealisticMS
I think the 3rd world comments were meant as a joke. Maybe a bit of sarcasm at the ones who complain about aminor incident?.
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For all you people who are complaining about how long it takes to restore power.
Don`t you realise there are only one or two men on the island with big enough right legs to kick start the generators we have and getting them to St.Sampsons takes time?
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nocon – those one or two men will need very big legs if they are trying to kick start the generators while in St Sampsons!
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Andy,
It`s good to see that someone understands why there are only a few men with big enough legs on the island. It`s a good job you`re on the ball buddy.
I would have included the ladies in my comment (and there are a few with big enough legs for the job) but some would have been upset so I left them out. I wouldn`t want to be dragged over the coals for being sexist.
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I hardly think that having some information is too much to ask. No, it’s not a life changing catastrophe, but being able to phone a number at Guernsey Electricity, and even just to hear a pre-recorded message to say “Apologies for the outage, we expect it to be back up within 1 hour” – or something, is definitely not the moon on a stick.
It was no big deal in the end, but when the lights first go out you do want to know when they might be back on. So on this occasion I agree with that Disgruntled bloke, or blokess.
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