Power outages continued in several areas until early hours

The supply of electricity remained suspended in several parts of Karachi during the early hours of Sunday despite K-Electric’s repeated assurances that power distribution had resumed.

The city had suffered a massive electricity breakdown on Saturday morning in the sweltering weather due to a fault at the Bin Qasim power station that disrupted the essential commodity’s supply for the entire day.

A large part of Karachi suffered electricity outage of up to nine or more hours as heavy smoke billowed out of the gas insulating system of a plant at Bin Qasim due to a mechanical fault. Residential areas and business centres of North Karachi, Golimar, Korangi, Nazimabad, North Nazimabad, Al-Asif Square, Saddar, Shah Faisal, old city localities, Lyari, Landhi, Liaquatabad, Gulistan-e-Jauhar, Federal B Area, Clifton, Safoora, PECHS and DHA were among the parts of the city that were deprived of power.

According to KE, electricity supply was interrupted after a 220kV high-tension line tripped. “Due to this, supply to associated grids was affected,” it said, assuring citizens that restoration had started and would be completed within an hour.

A KE spokesperson said that the power utility’s 220kV extra-high-tension network experienced tripping on Saturday afternoon, along with the 220kV NKI-Baldia 1 & 2 circuit. “The NTDC and KE teams immediately responded by coordinating closely for the restoration of the circuits. The connection with the national grid and, subsequently, power supply to all the affected grids was restored within an hour.”

The spokesperson said power supply to strategic installations such as KWSB’s water pumping stations, the airport and major hospitals was also restored on a priority basis, while supply to areas such as North Nazimabad, Lyari, Federal B Area, Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Gulistan-e-Jauhar, Defence and Clifton was normalised within a few hours.

In the early hours of Sunday, however, electricity remained suspended in Baldia Ittehad Town, Qaimkhani Colony, Orangi, Shanti Nagar, Korangi, Malir Shamsi Society and Shah Faisal Colony. Several areas of Lyari also remained without power until Sunday morning since the Saturday afternoon breakdown.

A Landhi resident, Ebaad, tweeted how they had been facing three-hour power outages every three hours. A Covid-positive resident of Nazimabad lamented that they had been facing intermittent power failures since Saturday evening.

KE CEO Moonis Alvi, however, tweeted that he was happy to report that “the entire city is normal”. “There can be downstream isolated faults which will be fixed in the normal course of business and those should not be construed as [load-shedding] or tripping.”