1
00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:04,280
Speaker 1: As I said, we know that overnight, well late yesterday afternoon,

2
00:00:04,280 --> 00:00:06,080
Speaker 1: I guess you'd say, is when it sort of started

3
00:00:06,120 --> 00:00:08,440
Speaker 1: to occur. But questions are now being asked this morning

4
00:00:08,440 --> 00:00:12,200
Speaker 1: about this widespread power outage which occurred last night, affecting

5
00:00:12,320 --> 00:00:16,840
Speaker 1: nineteen suburbs and twenty thousand customers along Darwin to Catherine,

6
00:00:16,880 --> 00:00:19,599
Speaker 1: the dah and to Catherine Grid. Now joining us on

7
00:00:19,880 --> 00:00:23,200
Speaker 1: the line from Power and Water is Mike Besselink. Good

8
00:00:23,239 --> 00:00:23,799
Speaker 1: morning to you.

9
00:00:23,920 --> 00:00:27,000
Speaker 2: Michael, Good morning. How are you kedy?

10
00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:29,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, really good, Thank you so much for your time

11
00:00:29,320 --> 00:00:33,360
Speaker 1: this morning. Now, Mike, twenty thousand customers. What period of

12
00:00:33,400 --> 00:00:37,320
Speaker 1: time was that power out for the majority of customers?

13
00:00:38,479 --> 00:00:42,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, so the power went out around about five forty

14
00:00:42,520 --> 00:00:45,880
Speaker 2: yesterday and as you said, across the dar and Palmerston

15
00:00:45,920 --> 00:00:51,040
Speaker 2: and Catherine areas, we're about twenty thousand customers. The team

16
00:00:51,080 --> 00:00:56,600
Speaker 2: worked pretty hard the safely restore power for these customers

17
00:00:56,680 --> 00:01:00,720
Speaker 2: and around seven sixty pm last night all the power

18
00:01:01,040 --> 00:01:04,479
Speaker 2: was back on. So around about two.

19
00:01:04,400 --> 00:01:09,880
Speaker 1: Hours now were businesses affected, were health facilities affected? Or

20
00:01:10,000 --> 00:01:13,520
Speaker 1: was it majority residents around the top end.

21
00:01:15,480 --> 00:01:19,080
Speaker 2: So basically, when the power goes out, two of us

22
00:01:19,120 --> 00:01:22,760
Speaker 2: connected to those feats that go out, So it's probably

23
00:01:22,840 --> 00:01:25,320
Speaker 2: a mix of all of those. And what we do

24
00:01:25,440 --> 00:01:28,759
Speaker 2: then is we look at some of our priority customers

25
00:01:28,880 --> 00:01:34,960
Speaker 2: like hospitals and some of our vulnerable customers who maybe

26
00:01:35,120 --> 00:01:39,440
Speaker 2: like support customers. We talked to them, contact them and

27
00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:45,600
Speaker 2: mean where possible, we actually had priority restoration around those

28
00:01:45,600 --> 00:01:46,720
Speaker 2: particular areas.

29
00:01:46,920 --> 00:01:49,400
Speaker 1: Do you have any idea, you know, whether they were

30
00:01:49,640 --> 00:01:51,640
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm assuming that there were some of those

31
00:01:51,680 --> 00:01:54,920
Speaker 1: priority customers that were impacted, but do you have much

32
00:01:54,920 --> 00:01:57,840
Speaker 1: of an idea how they were going last night and

33
00:01:57,840 --> 00:02:00,720
Speaker 1: whether it had a bad impact on them.

34
00:02:02,520 --> 00:02:05,680
Speaker 2: I haven't heard that there's been any adverse impact on

35
00:02:05,720 --> 00:02:10,560
Speaker 2: any of those. Our teams have had contacted a number

36
00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:14,600
Speaker 2: of those customers or they went through so that No,

37
00:02:14,720 --> 00:02:17,200
Speaker 2: I haven't heard there's been any adverse impact.

38
00:02:16,840 --> 00:02:20,160
Speaker 1: On any out Mike. The big question this morning is

39
00:02:20,240 --> 00:02:22,320
Speaker 1: what has caused this outage?

40
00:02:24,280 --> 00:02:30,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, so the atage was localites to the Channel Island

41
00:02:30,560 --> 00:02:35,760
Speaker 2: Power Station, which is the territory generation power station. So

42
00:02:35,880 --> 00:02:41,880
Speaker 2: that adage there was a localized issue of gas float

43
00:02:41,960 --> 00:02:45,320
Speaker 2: or a couple of the generators and that was then

44
00:02:46,320 --> 00:02:51,320
Speaker 2: discovered and restored by the teams. As we said, we're

45
00:02:51,360 --> 00:02:54,880
Speaker 2: in a fairly good time at about two hours. It

46
00:02:55,040 --> 00:02:57,440
Speaker 2: was a lot of good work done by the teams

47
00:02:57,440 --> 00:03:01,480
Speaker 2: to actually work to do that restoration. Yeah, so it

48
00:03:01,560 --> 00:03:07,360
Speaker 2: was localized. It was and found and fixed and the

49
00:03:07,400 --> 00:03:08,679
Speaker 2: generators restarted.

50
00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:11,919
Speaker 1: So, Mike, are we talking a supply issue here with

51
00:03:12,080 --> 00:03:12,799
Speaker 1: the gas?

52
00:03:14,000 --> 00:03:16,520
Speaker 2: No, this is not a supply issue. This is more

53
00:03:16,560 --> 00:03:22,120
Speaker 2: of an issue with equipment that is at the local area.

54
00:03:22,200 --> 00:03:25,079
Speaker 2: So it was not a supply issue that caused this.

55
00:03:25,680 --> 00:03:29,760
Speaker 1: So I mean, is that Power Waters equipment or is

56
00:03:29,800 --> 00:03:31,799
Speaker 1: that the suppliers equipment?

57
00:03:33,520 --> 00:03:40,960
Speaker 2: The I think APA this morning put out a press

58
00:03:41,000 --> 00:03:46,320
Speaker 2: release that they had some failures of their equipment that

59
00:03:46,440 --> 00:03:52,440
Speaker 2: was supplying channel and power station. So that was equipment

60
00:03:52,520 --> 00:03:53,840
Speaker 2: that's not Power and Waters.

61
00:03:53,920 --> 00:03:56,800
Speaker 1: Now, well, I will definitely read their statement out shortly.

62
00:03:56,880 --> 00:03:59,600
Speaker 1: I have got a full copy of that. I suppose

63
00:03:59,680 --> 00:04:01,680
Speaker 1: plenty of people who've lived here for a while are

64
00:04:01,680 --> 00:04:03,560
Speaker 1: going to be asking the question though as well, it's

65
00:04:03,600 --> 00:04:06,360
Speaker 1: not the first time that we've had an issue with

66
00:04:06,560 --> 00:04:11,240
Speaker 1: that gas and you know, the power then will going out?

67
00:04:12,480 --> 00:04:14,280
Speaker 1: Is it the same issue as what we've had in

68
00:04:14,280 --> 00:04:15,960
Speaker 1: the past or is it something different?

69
00:04:17,480 --> 00:04:21,000
Speaker 2: Well, that's at this stage I can't answer that directly.

70
00:04:21,040 --> 00:04:24,520
Speaker 2: What I can say, Katie, is that there is an

71
00:04:24,520 --> 00:04:27,880
Speaker 2: investigation now going on so that I'm sure is going

72
00:04:27,920 --> 00:04:30,640
Speaker 2: to come up with a number of improven opportunities to

73
00:04:30,640 --> 00:04:36,240
Speaker 2: come out of that investigation. So from that there will

74
00:04:36,279 --> 00:04:39,120
Speaker 2: be looking at whether or not it was the same

75
00:04:39,160 --> 00:04:42,000
Speaker 2: as before or whether there's something different. But I can't

76
00:04:42,040 --> 00:04:45,800
Speaker 2: give you an answer to that until that investigation is complete,

77
00:04:46,040 --> 00:04:48,880
Speaker 2: all right, But I think the key thing for us,

78
00:04:49,839 --> 00:04:54,400
Speaker 2: certainly and territorians to take some comfort in, I think

79
00:04:54,480 --> 00:04:56,960
Speaker 2: is that the fact that in a part of our

80
00:04:57,040 --> 00:05:00,600
Speaker 2: role is to manage that safe and speed us when

81
00:05:00,640 --> 00:05:04,840
Speaker 2: things get wrong, and seeing out there are some of

82
00:05:04,880 --> 00:05:06,520
Speaker 2: the best teams in the country and they do a

83
00:05:06,600 --> 00:05:09,159
Speaker 2: very good job. But you bring it back twenty thousand

84
00:05:09,240 --> 00:05:13,280
Speaker 2: customers in two hours. It's a pretty good effort for

85
00:05:13,720 --> 00:05:14,200
Speaker 2: that thing.

86
00:05:14,640 --> 00:05:17,120
Speaker 1: It is a monumental effort. And I know that lots

87
00:05:17,160 --> 00:05:19,760
Speaker 1: of those crews listen to the show, and a big

88
00:05:19,800 --> 00:05:22,200
Speaker 1: thank you to all of those staff that did manage

89
00:05:22,240 --> 00:05:24,719
Speaker 1: to get the power back online. It is certainly a

90
00:05:24,839 --> 00:05:28,000
Speaker 1: job well done in terms of that review. Now all

91
00:05:28,040 --> 00:05:31,000
Speaker 1: that investigation that's going to take place to determine exactly

92
00:05:31,040 --> 00:05:35,920
Speaker 1: what's gone on, Mike, any idea how long that will take, not.

93
00:05:36,000 --> 00:05:40,680
Speaker 2: At this stage, Katie. Probably as the day goes through,

94
00:05:40,720 --> 00:05:43,240
Speaker 2: we'll probably find out a bit more about that. At

95
00:05:43,240 --> 00:05:44,920
Speaker 2: this stage, I haven't got a timeline on that.

96
00:05:45,360 --> 00:05:47,800
Speaker 1: I know the Chief Minister had told another media outlet

97
00:05:47,839 --> 00:05:51,720
Speaker 1: this morning that power was now being supplied. She understood

98
00:05:51,720 --> 00:05:55,560
Speaker 1: by Santos. Is that the case or not power? Sorry,

99
00:05:55,560 --> 00:05:57,440
Speaker 1: the gas.

100
00:05:58,760 --> 00:06:02,360
Speaker 2: We get gas from a range of sources, but I'm

101
00:06:02,400 --> 00:06:05,120
Speaker 2: probably not the expert on all of the different sources

102
00:06:05,120 --> 00:06:07,680
Speaker 2: we get it from. Unfortunately, that's all right, but we

103
00:06:07,839 --> 00:06:10,880
Speaker 2: do have we do have gaps that comes from a

104
00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:11,880
Speaker 2: range of sources.

105
00:06:12,160 --> 00:06:15,839
Speaker 1: That's all right now in terms of you know, in

106
00:06:15,920 --> 00:06:18,760
Speaker 1: terms of what's happening now to try to avoid this

107
00:06:18,880 --> 00:06:22,320
Speaker 1: from happening again, I guess that's all going to be

108
00:06:22,440 --> 00:06:24,520
Speaker 1: part of that review. But what can you tell our

109
00:06:24,560 --> 00:06:25,520
Speaker 1: listeners this morning?

110
00:06:27,400 --> 00:06:29,800
Speaker 2: What I can tell the listener this morning is that

111
00:06:30,720 --> 00:06:34,240
Speaker 2: we have, as I said, some of the some of

112
00:06:34,240 --> 00:06:39,279
Speaker 2: the best crews around. We know that we've got unexpected

113
00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:44,400
Speaker 2: outages do occur from time to time, and we've got

114
00:06:44,480 --> 00:06:48,400
Speaker 2: some verys of people to actually bring those the power

115
00:06:48,440 --> 00:06:52,600
Speaker 2: back on in the just and quickest time possible, and

116
00:06:53,160 --> 00:06:57,159
Speaker 2: we will be looking at the cause of this outagen

117
00:06:57,880 --> 00:07:02,840
Speaker 2: and working through some the improvements if those improvements need.

118
00:07:02,880 --> 00:07:04,839
Speaker 2: If you don't entrepreneres.

119
00:07:04,680 --> 00:07:07,440
Speaker 1: Mike, what assurances can you give our listeners this morning

120
00:07:07,480 --> 00:07:09,640
Speaker 1: that the season's going to happen again.

121
00:07:11,720 --> 00:07:16,240
Speaker 2: Again, Cadie, once we work through and find out what

122
00:07:17,080 --> 00:07:21,000
Speaker 2: the problem wants and fix up whatever that is. And

123
00:07:21,040 --> 00:07:26,040
Speaker 2: that's primarily through APA, working through what that might have been,

124
00:07:26,120 --> 00:07:28,720
Speaker 2: and working through to have a look at those issues.

125
00:07:29,960 --> 00:07:34,080
Speaker 2: But what assurance that they can give the listeners is,

126
00:07:34,360 --> 00:07:38,800
Speaker 2: but we'll work very hard to get everything stable and

127
00:07:38,920 --> 00:07:45,480
Speaker 2: keep everything on and provide powers to territorius on a

128
00:07:45,520 --> 00:07:46,840
Speaker 2: consistent basis.

129
00:07:47,280 --> 00:07:48,840
Speaker 1: I do just want to ask, because I know that

130
00:07:48,920 --> 00:07:52,120
Speaker 1: this question will probably start to flow through throughout the day,

131
00:07:52,840 --> 00:07:55,120
Speaker 1: are there going to be any customers that will be

132
00:07:55,240 --> 00:07:57,640
Speaker 1: compensated or was the power not out sort of for

133
00:07:57,640 --> 00:07:59,720
Speaker 1: a long enough period for that to happen.

134
00:08:01,680 --> 00:08:06,120
Speaker 2: Again? With that there it will be an individual case

135
00:08:06,160 --> 00:08:08,960
Speaker 2: by case basus for what actually happened with that that

136
00:08:09,080 --> 00:08:12,400
Speaker 2: they need to call out contact customer center if they

137
00:08:12,840 --> 00:08:18,240
Speaker 2: have been affected to see what that is. But in general,

138
00:08:19,160 --> 00:08:23,000
Speaker 2: a two hour outage normally doesn't cause a great deal

139
00:08:23,040 --> 00:08:28,680
Speaker 2: of sport. Leedgit materials or your groceries of goods or

140
00:08:28,840 --> 00:08:31,880
Speaker 2: things like that. But you know, if they have been affected,

141
00:08:31,920 --> 00:08:32,800
Speaker 2: they need to call their.

142
00:08:33,000 --> 00:08:37,160
Speaker 1: Customer contact then well, Mike Beslink from Power and Water,

143
00:08:37,400 --> 00:08:39,960
Speaker 1: I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much

144
00:08:40,040 --> 00:08:42,880
Speaker 1: for speaking with us and letting our listeners know exactly

145
00:08:42,960 --> 00:08:43,640
Speaker 1: what's going on.

146
00:08:45,120 --> 00:08:46,760
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Katie, thank you