60,000 homes back online as Ergon crews hit final stretch after ex-cyclone Kirrily
Almost every house in Townsville should have its power fully restored by Tuesday night, with Ergon crews hitting the homestretch after five days of hard work.
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Almost every house in Townsville should have its power fully restored by Tuesday night, with Ergon crews hitting the homestretch after five days of hard work.
Townsville-based area manager Wayne Alderman said about 93 per cent or more than 60,000 Ergon customers, had power restored by Sunday night
He said the majority of the remaining customers in Townsville should be back online by Monday or Tuesday night at the latest.
More than 900 residents in Bluewater and parts of Saunders Beach still didn’t have power when they woke up on Monday, but Ergon hoped to have it back on by the day’s end.
More than 1080 residents across Alligator Creek, Cape Cleveland, Gumlu, Julago, Nome, and Stuart, also still in the dark, have been told to expect to be fully restored by Tuesday.
“We got quite a lot of people on that at the moment … we’ll get the front half of that on (Monday night) with the remainder of that completed by (Tuesday) night,’ he said.
He said those areas in Townsville’s outer suburbs had a lot more fallen tree damage for crews to deal with.
Ergon crews also used a helicopter to fix damage at a communications tower on Castle Hill.
“During the cyclone, we’ve had a wire coming down from one of our poles up there that feeds the communications tower,” he said.
“So (Monday) morning, we’ve had a helicopter pull that wire back up there, so that will be up and up and going by the evening.”
Mr Alderman said that with 750 workers on the ground working through the heatwave, it was great to have members of the public offering them support.
“We’ve had members of the public bringing us ice creams, drinks, doughnuts, things like that, and it always puts a smile on the guy’s faces,” he said.
Originally published as 60,000 homes back online as Ergon crews hit final stretch after ex-cyclone Kirrily
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