Much of Johannesburg was plunged into darkness on Thursday afternoon because of a power failure.
The electricity went down shortly before 1pm when supply to the Fordsburg substation was lost, said Johannesburg City Power spokesperson Louis Pieterse.
It is one of the city’s main intake substations where electricity is imported from Eskom, he said.
The cause of the power failure was not immediately known, but sometimes this occurs because of cable theft or fire. City Power was in talks with Eskom.
It was thought the fault was on the 275kV transmission line.
Pieterse said reconfiguration of the network had enabled the restoration of power to Hursthill, Melville, Auckland Park, Mayfair and Crosby.
However, there was not enough capacity to get power back to parts of the CBD, Lenasia and Industria. These areas were still without electricity at 2.30pm.
”We are desperate to get the supply back,” he said.
It’s only when it is known what has happened that the supply can be completely restored. Pieterse could not say how long that might take. — Sapa