PHILIPSBURG--Widespread power outages were experienced on Saturday, Sunday and up to Monday night. GEBE announced via press release late Monday night that there had been “technical issues with several of the power generators” at its Cay Bay power plant starting from Sunday.
GEBE said in the release that all districts had been affected by load-shedding throughout Monday, but it hoped to have the issue resolved by midnight.
Outages on Monday ranged from one to two hours.
“On Sunday morning the Cay Bay power plant started to experience problems with production unit DG-18. Power generation units DG-7 and DG-19 are currently off due to a major overhaul of those units,” the release read.
GEBE said various districts, including Cupecoy, Dutch Lowlands, Cay Hill, Cul de Sac, St. Peters, Mary’s Fancy, Oyster Pond, Pointe Blanche, Over the Bank, Pelican Keys, Paper Garden, Dutch Quarter and Belvedere, had been affected by the load-shedding on Sunday starting at 10:20am.
However, it should be noted that The Daily Herald received reports of a number of outages on Saturday as well.
“GEBE has attempted to limit load-shedding in the various districts to a minimum. NV GEBE tried on Monday to avoid having to disrupt the main feeder cables that supply electricity to schools, water production facilities, the airport and the St. Maarten Medical Center (SMMC),” it said.
Attempts to obtain comments from company representatives proved futile until the press release was issued late Monday night, but GEBE posted to social media on Sunday evening that the company was “experiencing issues at the power plant which is causing [it – Ed.] to load-shed.” The nature of the “issues” was not disclosed.
In a later post just before noon on Monday, the company said the issues had to do with engines at the plant. In the same post, it stated that three areas, Belvedere, Cole Bay and Simpson Bay would be affected for 90 minutes.
However, as it unfolded, all districts were affected. It could be established that some of the districts were affected twice in the day on Monday and one customer told this newspaper that when she called the company to complain about experiencing outages twice in one day, she had been told that this was happening in every district.
Several consumers complained through the newspaper and on the company’s social media feed of not being warned on time.
In its press release, the company apologised to customers for the inconvenience and assured that it would continue to work at resolving it.
