Large parts of Sindh, Balochistan suffer power breakdown: Karachi plunges into darkness

News desk

KARACHI: Large parts of Balochistan and Sindh, including over 85 per cent of Karachi, plunged into darkness following a major power breakdown in the city late Friday putting people of both the provinces into extreme discomfort. While the K-Electric described tripping of extra high tension line as the cause, NTDC refused to buy the argument, terming it “incomprehensible.”

In Karachi, large parts of the city plunged into darkness at around 10 pm, including the sensitive Red Zone as well as Jinnah Terminal and parts of the larger Karachi airport.

Till the filing of this story, it continued to remain so, while the K-Electric spokesperson claimed partial restoration had begun. Breakdown was also reported from Dhabeji water pumping station, Gharo and Pipri power stations that led to suspension of water supply to most parts of the city.

The areas where power supply was suspended included Defence, Saddar, Old City, PECHS, Jamshed Road, Lines Area, Soldier Bazar, Gurumandir, Garden, Pak Colony, Mehmoodabad, Baloch Colony, Nazimabad, North Nazimabad, North Karachi, Federal B Area, Karimabad, Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Gullistan-e-Jauhar, Shah Faisal, Karachi airport, Malir, Quaidabad, Orangi Town, Korangi, Landhi and others.

The K-Electric on its twitter handle said “power supply to majority of areas of the megapolis was suspended because of tripping of both the circuits of 500KV Jamshoro Grid feeding Karachi.” Quoting spokesperson, it said “this has had a rollover effect on Karachi’s electric supply due to which various parts of the city are experiencing an outage. The NTDC sources said the suspension of power supply in Karachi remains beyond comprehension, and added, the tripping of Jamshoro-Karachi transmission line cannot suspend the K-Electric system. The failure of K-Electric to invest in generation and transmission systems continues to be a bane for the Karchiites who suffer from blackouts of various intensities. Similarly, the megapolis suffers from tripping problems every now and then, causing long period of outages. Experts believe “shunt isolators” are a technical solution to prevent it. Even previously, failure to prevent tripping caused power restoration to take long time. Due to shunt isolators, power could be restored in an hour, experts suggest.

Besides Karachi, as many as 13 districts of Sindh also suffered a long blackout following rains in interior of the province. This led to shutting down of 78 grid stations of Hesco, suspending power to Hyderabad and Badin, Matli, Golarchi, Talhar, Tando Bago, Tando Mohanmmad Khan, Digri, Mipurkhas, Tando Jam, Matiari, Nawabshah, Umerkot, Sanghar, etc. According to the Hesco chief, wind power plant at Jhimpir, Thatta, also suffered shutdown.

This followed tripping of extra high tension power lines supplying power from Guddu to Sindh and Balochistan, causing massive power disruption. According to Hesco chief Raham Ali, the 500 KV Jamshoro power line developed a technical defect leading to shutdown. Ali said they are trying to ascertain the technical reasons for the defect. The NTDC said rain caused five transmission lines to trip, including the 650 MW Jamshoro-Karachi transmission line and Jamshoro-Hubco power line.

Besides Sindh, districts Hub, Gadani, Uthal, Winder and Bela in Balochistan also suffered massive power shutdown, plunging them into darkness from which they had not recovered till early morning Saturday. However, strangely the NTDC refused any power breakdown in Balochistan.