The Guyana Power and Light (GPL) said its power outage on Thursday only lasted about half-an-hour and could not have caused the massive flooding in the city.
Georgetown Mayor Hamilton Green said on Thursday that both the Kitty and Liliendaal pump stations were affected by power outages and called for the GPL to provide a back-up power supply to enable the municipality to carry out drainage works.
Responding to this, GPL said in a press release: “the Demerara Interconnected System suffered a complete shutdown at 7.34 am during the heavy rains yesterday. Power was restored to the Kitty pump at 8.02 am and to the Liliendaal pump at 8.09 am.”
According to the release, the pumps were idle for half an hour which would have affected operations. The release suggested that the non-functioning of the pumps could not have caused the flooding. GPL said “did the power outage affect pumping operations, yes it did, did this idle time result in the flooding in Georgetown, the conclusion is obvious.”
In a statement, Green had said that the sole electrically-driven pump at Liliendaal could not function on Thursday because of a power outage. He said GPL should provide another power source to the Liliendaal Pump Station since power supply is critical to the unit in that area. Additionally, he said the hydro-flow pump was removed and taken to another location.
Green also explained that there was only one functioning electrically-driven pump at the Kitty station, but that it was also disabled as a result of the power outage.
they should have a back-up power system in place then a back-up to the back-up.
they are talking about a perfect scenario when the drains are not clogged, where the people are not throwing garbbage all over the place and then 1/2 an hour of the mal-functioning pumps would not contribute to massive flooding.
One would have to take all elements in play along with the lack of efficient electricity which may have contributed to the flooding.
And then, here we go again with the blame game. Just as long as they have someone to throw the blame on then their work is done.
Wrong – check on the entire system to see what else failed / is failing and which contributed to the massive flooding because it could not have been just one factor. Then fix it for crying out loud. Say thing over and over again each rainy season.
The blame game is ridiculous, solving this stuff is just so rudimentary it makes you wonder what the heck are these people doing in government.
The emerging culture among public officials in Guyana, in which they find convenient scapegoats for administrative failures, seems to be the new normal. If GPL is reporting that there was a loss of power in its grid for .5 hour, them the “unusual retention of water” can be attributed to several factors. The following are some plausible explanations that readily come to mind: an obvious mismatch between the pumps and the desired volume of water to discharge, a no show by operators, failure to monitor the official rainfall forecast, failure to have a flood contingency plan in place, excessively high volume of water originating from unknown sources entering the dendritic drainage system or there may be a seicher in the drainage system. Perhaps, the metrological department may be in a position to explain the last hypothesis. Guyanese politicians must demonstrate maturity and admit their wrong doing when they have faltered, or relinquish their office or put systems in place so as to prevent history from repeating itself with equal or greater vengeance. There is absolutely nothing wrong to call a spade a spade but it is horribly awkward to call a spade a shovel. Happy Sunday to all of you…
The real culture in Guyana is to blame someone so nothing gets done. We have been having power failure in Guyana as long as I can remember, so it should not be rocket science to have a back up system for everything. In most of the developed world where there is are more dependable systems, there is such contengency. It should be a no brainer, any system in Guyana MUST have a back up, if not you are setting yourself up for failure from the beginning.
GPL, the frequent blackout on the East Coast Demerara is damaging our electrical appliances. I am SICK of it and GPL. EVERYDAY is blackout. Stuupes.
Daffodil30, I share your concern. My family and I experienced it until 2003. I can recall some horrible episodes; thankfully we never had food poisoning nor were our appliances damaged. I had to purchase 2-3000 watts stabilizers for my household equipment. The stabilizers saved the day and we survived to tell our story. Good luck to you and your family…
Don’t worry GPL.. we all know that blaming the power situation was the smoke screen.
green made a mess of everything that he an burnham wasin charge of !… now he’s here scanctioning of the “causes” of the flood !
to put this into perspective ,, one wonders if green really knows what he’s talking abt ,, and indeed ,, 0.5 hrs of no power
could not by this fact be soley responsible ,,but it was a sore accessory to the fact !….
You know why we still having blackout 17 years after the PPP has been in office?
Is because of oh laud 28 years, ow how we manage to survive de 28 years oh laudd all de money de pnc tief still aint rivaling our record wid Duprey but is still ow laud 28 years.
Is 28 years of blackout mek de blackout still blacking out……Bheri Bheri you dere padna? Misirable? Goonsarran?
ow laud is 28 years we had to suffer, ow is 28 years.
Actually the reason for this flooding is because of Corbin, yep many people do not know it but it really is the PNC who behind this insurgent flooding….
Shoddy electrical installation and improper cover of Ground Fault Interrupt (GFI) breakers.Water entered the sensitive power supply and tripped the breakers.
‘The blameing game’as usual,but,BLACKOUTS MUST STOP.
Danny ask Jagdeo how come he hasn’t purchased a single windmill in 17 yearz but they have purchased a fleet of prados?
Where are the priorities?
I don’t feel sorry for Guyanese anymore. As far as i’m concerned they are getting just what they deserve for continuing to support these inept parties and administrations. Have fun wading in the water…
Well I do feel sorry for them but you are right these people need to wake up and realize only they can help themselves. They have to vote, speak up and really let people know that this is no longer acceptable and we as a people will not let jagdeo and his band of merry men get away with the trash they have been feeding us for the past 17 years.
It will no longer be tolerated.