A second Guyana Power and Light (GPL) Inc. submarine cable was disrupted today due to another a maritime accident, four days following the disruption of its major 69kV submarine cable.
A GPL release this evening said that its 13.8kV submarine cable that rests along the Demerara River within the proximity of Craig, East Bank Demerara was dislodged by a barge sailing along the Demerara River. This incident occurred around 04:23 hrs.
As a result of this incident customers from Vriesland to La Retraite on the West Demerara were without electricity until 07:46 hrs while efforts were underway to alternatively power these customers from the Vreed-en-Hoop Substation.
GPL said that the dislodged cable was located this afternoon by deep water divers and efforts are being made to hoist and examine it for damage.
Repairs were done to the onshore transmission and distribution infrastructure that connects to the cable as this was also damaged during the incident.
Meanwhile, GPL said that it concluded its examination of the 69 kV submarine cable laid on the river bed along the channel of the Demerara River connecting the Vreed-en-Hoop and Kingston Power Stations. This examination revealed no further damage on the cable.
As previously reported, investigations done on June 5, revealed a compromised section of the cable approximately 0.7 km offshore from its Kingston operations.
GPL said that officials from the China Machinery Import and Export Corporation (CMC) were a part of efforts to retrieve and examine the submarine cable and are at present preparing a plan of action.
In the interim, GPL said that it is continuing to engage the Maritime Administration Department in identifying an alternative route to lay a 13.8kV submarine cable along the Demerara River, in an effort to reconnect the Vreed-en-Hoop operations to the Eastern sections of the Demerara-Berbice Interconnected System.
