Bahamas Power and Light Chief Operating Officer, Anthony Christie provided an update on power restoration efforts in the wake of a severe weather event that occurred in eastern New Providence on Friday.

According to Christie power has been restored in affected areas such as Kool Acres and south Fox Hill. He told reporters on Monday, “following that we would have had some isolated areas that presented some challenges inclusive of Imperial Park due to the design and structure of the poles accessibility was a challenge.”

Christie said the areas of San Souci, Fox Hill Road, High Vista and Eastern Road and Chancery Lane also posed a challenge which caused delays in power restoration. He said as of Monday at 9am on Monday the majority of customers were back online. At the time of the briefing customers on Mandarin Drive were still without power due to major damage cause to BPL assets.

The BPL COO also explained what happened during the weather event to cause the damage. He said, “most areas that are underground were not impacted unless there was a heavy surge that caused the cable fault as in the case of San Souci where you have to go underground. But again, because of the high level of surge created by the lightning strike this caused the equipment to damage and of course if lightning strikes the poles itself would snap and that would have to be replaced, re-dug and placed so that the lines can be pulled and reconnection done.”

Christie continued saying, “on Fox Hill Road south I witnessed and they showed me that three poles were damaged there but it was a lot of lines, low voltage and high voltage lines, that were impacted that came down. Trees impacted the lines and caused faults as well. So a lot of trees impacted the lines that had to be cleared and again, trees may not have been impacting the lines but because of the wind and whenever they broke the fell across the lines.”

Power restoration efforts continue .