Minister and PUCSL demand reports on countrywide power failure in three days
COLOMBO – The Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) has demanded the Ceylon Electricity Board submit an investigative report on Monday’s (17) islandwide power failure within the next three days.
A countrywide power failure occurred shortly after the new Minister for Power, Dullas Alahapperuma, took office, and plunged the country into darkness for close to seven hours.
An independent television network reported power minister had announced a committee had been appointed to investigate the breakdown and a report is to be submitted to the minister in the next three days.
The countrywide power outage also created traffic chaos, particularly in Colombo and Greater Colombo areas, which saw massive traffic jams, leading many motorists to deem driving a “traffic nightmare”. However officers of the Traffic Police were deployed at most intersections.
The Government Information Department, in a statement issued Monday, attributed the blackout to a failure at the Kerawalapitiya Grid sub-station at 12:35 p.m., leading to cascading failures.
According to local reports some of the substations had been manually reconnected enabling power to be restored to Colombo suburbs around 6:00 p.m.
The CEB issued a public apology to the Sri Lankan people.
The PUCSL, in a letter to the CEB General Manager, said an investigative report should be submitted by August 20 and a detailed report on how a similar occurrence can be avoided by September 17.
-economynext.com/ENCL