MAJOR EAST AUCKLAND POWER OUTAGE AFFECTS 185,000 PEOPLE
This month Auckland experienced a major power outage due to a fire at the Penrose electricity substation. All suburbs in the Eastern half of the Auckland isthmus were affected. 85,000 households and businesses (185,000 people) lost electricity. Almost a half of these households and businesses were without electricity for between 1 and 2.5 days. Most shops and businesses closed due to not having electricity. At the height of the outage 128 cell towers and 7 telephone exchanges were down and traffic lights on 140 road intersections stopped working. 49 wastewater pumping stations lost electricity resulting in 4 wastewater overflows into the environment.