7:00 PM update Thursday 28 November 2019
Unfortunately the latest update from Ausgrid is not good news. I am continuing to seek a natural disaster declaration and speaking to ministers and to senior Ausgrid representatives.
This is the text of Ausgrid's latest update shortly before 4pm today
Ausgrid emergency crews have restored power to another 5,000 customers this afternoon who were impacted by the severe storms in Sydney.
At the height of the storm 52,000 homes and businesses lost power. We have now restored power safely to 36,000 customers.
Power is still out to about 16,000 customers in the hardest hit areas in Sydney’s north and those customers are being advised to prepare for the outages there to last into the weekend.
The main impacted areas include parts of Roseville, Frenchs Forest, Gordon, Pymble, Killara, Chatswood, East Lindfield, Mount Colah, Lindfield, Belrose, Castlecrag, Willoughby, Castle Cove, Hornsby Heights, Middle Cove, Roseville Chase, Allambie Heights, St Ives, Mosman, East Lindfield, Mount Ku-ring-gai, Epping, Duffys Forest, North Willoughby, Thornleigh and pockets of other surrounding areas.
Ausgrid staff are doorknocking the hardest hit areas to provide more information to residents.
Customers who rely on a continuous power supply for medical or life support equipment should relocate if they haven’t done so already.
Chief Operating Officer Trevor Armstrong has thanked customers for their patience.
“We understand just how inconvenient this has been for customers and we’d like to thank them for their understanding as we work to repair extreme damage to the network.
“This is some of the worst damage we have seen in a concentrated area and is similar to what you would expect to see after a cyclone.
“We have hundreds of people working hard to make hazards safe and rebuilding sections of the network from the ground up and unfortunately this takes time”, he said.
Extra crews are on the ground today helping from the Central Coast and Newcastle areas.
Additional resources have also arrived from both Endeavour Energy and Essential Energy with another team of 50 arriving from Endeavour Energy tonight to assist with the response.
As hazards are safe crews are installing new power poles and stringing new high and low voltage powerlines to enable us to reconnect properties.
There are many powerlines down in storm impacted areas. If you see fallen powerlines always assume they are live and stay at least eight metres away.
All three local councils are organising extra collections for rotting food and green waste. Take great care if you are out and about as there are many large branches still caught in trees. Go to my Jonathan O'Dea MP Facebook page for more information.
