SASCHA WIL­SON

There was an ex­plo­sion at the T&TEC Re­form Sub­sta­tion this morn­ing, af­ter a medi­um volt­age ca­ble mal­func­tioned. The in­ci­dent caused a dis­rup­tion in the elec­tric­i­ty sup­ply to cus­tomers, but no one was in­jured. 

Video footage of the plumes of smoke, fire and rum­bling nois­es from the plant has been cir­cu­lat­ing on so­cial me­dia.

T&TEC's Area Man­ag­er, Kelvin Ram­sook, told Guardian Me­dia the in­ci­dent oc­curred around 1 am, af­ter a 12 kV ca­ble failed.

"What it was, was a ca­ble fail­ure that we have since iso­lat­ed, and we’ve trans­ferred all the cus­tomers, and we are con­duct­ing re­pairs to the ca­ble," he said.

He gave as­sur­ances, how­ev­er, that the sys­tem has a built-in safe­ty mech­a­nism in the event of a fail­ure.

"Once you have a fault of that na­ture the sys­tem is de­signed to de-en­er­gize the cir­cuit so it is op­er­at­ing prop­er­ly, and the cir­cuit was de-en­er­gized," he said.

Ram­sook said it took about two hours to re­store elec­tric­i­ty to cus­tomers at Bonne Aven­ture and oth­er ar­eas in Gas­par­il­lo.