The on-off power situation that parts of the island experienced last night was due to an underground cable fault on Feeder 5 between Tafuna power plant and the LBJ Hospital.
The outage occurred around 6:40 pm and the hospital’s standby generator came on automatically restoring electricity supply to the hospital within seconds, says ASPA Executive Director Wallon Young.
Areas between Tafuna and Kent Samoa had power back on 30 minutes later followed by areas between Fagaalu and Matuu, about one hour later.
Young said ASPA’s T&D crews located an underground cable fault around 2:00 am last night..
High voltage megger tests (used to verify the condition of electrical insulation) confirmed a cable fault at Faganeanea.
Repairs began this morning with the replacement of approximately 900 feet of underground cable.
Young said a major disadvantage with underground cables when compared to overhead lines is the time it takes to locate and repair faults.
“Underground cable faults usually take many more hours to locate and repair,” he explained.
The ASPA Executive Director expressed on behalf of the authority sincere apologies for last night’s power outage.
Residents in the affected areas went complained on FaceBook about power surges and the power going on and off last night.
