Shops and dwellings in Rye High Street and East Street suffered an electricity outage for 24 hours from about 4pm on Friday afternoon, February 16. The area affected stretched from Ashbees to Rye Art Gallery and up East Street on both sides as far as The Union.
A UK Power Networks team quickly assembled and started investigating at the electricity substation on Conduit Hill. Their efforts were reportedly hampered by the presence of a parked car, according to one concerned resident who had contacted the emergency services for information, “and I actually spoke to a real person”, said Jane who lives in East Street. The work of locating the fault then switched to East Street, and the cable damage was soon located under the pavement near Chequer, the scene of ongoing building work.
However, another problem presented itself; health and safety regulations prohibit power network operatives from excavating within one meter per lift of scaffolding, equivalent to four metres in this particular case, for fear of causing collapse. When the team leader contacted the builder to request partial dismantling of the scaffolding this was refused.
Gloomily, he raised the possibility of a temporary emergency generator “to bridge the gap across the width of Chequer,” a prospect unlikely to commend itself to local residents. In fact this proved unnecessary and power supply was resumed to most if not all the affected properties by late afternoon on Saturday. Reinstatement work was suspended over the weekend and the trench filled with water following the heavy rains.
One business owner told your reporter: “We can really do without this; we’ve lost a really busy trading day this Friday evening.” Will he be seeking compensation? “No you never get anywhere,” he replied. The incident occurred within weeks of another interruption, caused by a gas leak opposite Chequer when a spur off the mains gas pipe had fractured, necessitating emergency repairs, with the street partially blocked off. The weight of off-loading of more than 50 skips of heavy building materials is a possible contributory factor behind both these events.
Image Credits: Kenneth Bird .