Sheradyn Holderhead: Someone needs to lose their job for power cut during February heatwave

ANALYSIS: Seriously, someone has to lose their job over the farce that was Wednesday night’s rolling blackout. Maybe that will make our leaders finally wake up.

• Meltdown: Deliberate power cuts amid heatwave ...
• ... on a day that Adelaide hit 42C, and Moomba 46C
• Meanwhile, Sydney has a storm and it keeps running
• Turnbull calls SA a socialist paradise, says it needs home generators

SERIOUSLY, someone has to lose their job over this farce.
Maybe that will make our leaders finally wake up.

This is far beyond a joke. South Australian homes and businesses were again without power. This time it was in the sweltering heat, without air conditioning because, according to SA Power Networks, there was just not enough reliable energy being generated to the keep the lights on.

Not only is it a health risk for the elderly and young children to have to endure 40C temperatures — and above — without aircon, but the repeated power outages are costing businesses tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars.

On Wednesday the state was again the butt of a joke in federal Parliament with senior South Australian MP Christopher Pyne conceding that power in SA was “what you would expect in a backpacker’s hostel in a third-world country” not a first-world state.

And, on Tuesday, the Prime Minister questioned whether an SA Labor MP was powering his own house by bicycle.

It’s no wonder SA has become a national laughing stock — the state that can’t keep the lights on. The September statewide blackout was followed by a number of widespread power outages from storm damage as well as brownouts or “load shedding” caused through lack of supply.

These events are making business people question if investment in SA is worth the risk, knowing that at any time the state could go black.

What makes Wednesday night’s outage, which affected more than 40,000 homes and businesses, even more unusual is that the Australian Energy Market Operator ordered the privately owned SA Power Networks to “load shed”, or switch some customers off because of a “lack of available generation supply in SA”.

But then, 45 minutes later, it ordered the power back on. While the details will become more clear in the coming days no doubt this raises questions about whether this blackout was even necessary. It was a hot day but we’ve had much hotter.

Will Premier Jay Weatherill be out now telling us it was an “unprecedented, once in 50-year hot day’’?

Maybe there was so much sun solar panels couldn’t cope. No doubt the Federal Government will point the finger at wind farms.

And Cory Bernardi will blame Malcolm Turnbull.

But this harks back to the September statewide blackout, which so far the evidence suggests did not need to happen if there had been better planning.

Back then it was obvious a strong storm was coming. On Wednesday it was pretty obvious demand was going to soar because of the heat. Clearly that’s a planning issue that surely could be prevented.

Despite disaster after disaster, the public has seen only buck passing and blame shifting from our policy makers.

Surely it’s time someone took ultimate responsibility and fell on their sword, or will we be left to wonder if any of our leaders — MPs on both sides and public servants — are taking this energy crisis seriously beyond the chance to score political points?