Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Power Restored to 83% of Customers Who Lost Electricity Supply during Hurricane Richard

-Press Release - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - Belize Electricity Limited (BEL) - As of 5:00 p.m. today, Belize Electricity Limited (BEL) has restored power to approximately 83 per cent of customers who lost power supply during the passage of Hurricane Richard.

In the Southern Zone, works today were concentrated mostly in Dangriga Town as power supply was fully restored to Independence, Punta Gorda and surrounding areas on Monday. Power supply has since been restored to 75% of Dangriga and surrounding areas. In the Western Zone, most areas were also restored by last night and today more sections in Belmopan and San Ignacio were restored, bringing the total percentage with power in the Western Zone to 91. In the Central Zone (Belize City and surrounding communities) power has been restored to 70% of affected customers.

BEL expects to restore power to most of the remaining affected areas by later tonight. There may still be pockets of customers who will remain without power, due to extensively damaged infrastructure, such as customer-owned service connections. These customers need to remain disconnected in order to carry out repairs.

As part of the restoration works, BEL work crews are thoroughly inspecting distribution power lines as well as service connections to customers’ homes and businesses to ensure that it is safe to energize each community. BEL must ensure that these issues are addressed before energizing power systems in various communities because low hanging wires and wires lying in water present a critical safety hazard to the public.

BEL thanks customers for their patience and will continue to provide updated information as it becomes available.

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