Brace for rolling overnight blackouts all weekend and until Thursday

08 October 2021 - 18:40
By Staff Reporter
Load-shedding will stay with us overnight. Stock photo.
Image: 123RF / beercrafter Load-shedding will stay with us overnight. Stock photo.

Stage 2 load-shedding will continue throughout this weekend right up until 5am on Thursday as Eskom grapples with more breakdowns and depleted emergency power reserves.

Eskom said just after 6pm on Friday that it “regrets to inform the public that stage 2 load-shedding will be extended throughout the weekend starting from 21:00 [on Friday] evening until 5am on Thursday morning.

“This load-shedding is also necessary to address other additional risks in the generation fleet.

“Total breakdowns amount to 14,760MW while planned maintenance is 5 ,77MW of capacity.

“While still recovering four units at Tutuka, which had experienced conveyor belt failures, the fleet suffered a cluster of boiler tube leaks within a short period of time.

“Emergency reserves have been further depleted today due to breakdowns of a generating unit each at Kusile, Komati and Hendrina power stations. The return of a generating unit at Majuba power station today provided some relief, however, this was insufficient to curb the extensive use of emergency reserves.”

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