Four inquiries underway into 17-minute blackout at new RAH

FOUR separate inquiries are now underway into the Royal Adelaide Hospital blackout including one by independent engineering consultants.

FOUR separate inquiries are now under way into the Royal Adelaide Hospital blackout, which plunged two operations into darkness and halted radiotherapy and a dialysis treatment.

Health Minister Peter Malinauskas has ordered an independent inquiry, which will be done by engineering experts the Frazer-Nash Consultancy.

Hospital operator Celsus is doing its own inquiry, as is consortium partner Spotless, while SA Health is looking into the communications issues which left two surgeons in the dark, midway through a colonoscopy in one case and a bile duct stone removal in the other.

Both surgeries were eventually completed and SA Health said no patient suffered adverse effects.

The blackout on Wednesday morning is being blamed on two software faults during routine monthly testing of six back-up generators.

Mr Malinauskas said he expected the independent report to be finalised before the election but could not give a guarantee, noting it was “independent, not government controlled”.

“We expect it to be sooner than the election,” he said.

The Opposition has called for the certifier who checked the hospital before the handover to do an inquiry.

Opposition health spokesman Stephen Wade said a Liberals government would bring in the certifier to audit all RAH systems. He said the relationship between the Government and Celsus has “degenerated into a rugby scrum of blame”.