Thousands of homes, farms and businesses remain without power tonight (Thursday, January 30) according to ESB Networks who said that there are still “many faults on the electricity network” following Storm Éowyn.
In the region of 86,000 customers remain without supply but ESB Networks said it had restored power to 682,000 customers.
“Restoration work is continuing.
“In the areas with the largest number of faults, as we make progress to repair the extensive damage, some customers may see their estimated restoration times change over the coming days,” it added.
Storm
According to ESB 285 “skilled technicians from counterparts in Austria, Finland, France and Great Britain are now on the ground” with communities that have been worst impacted by Storm Éowyn.
It also confirmed that further technicians are arriving from Germany, Netherlands and Norway over the coming days.
“They are supporting over 2,500 local ESB Networks crews and partner contactors in the worst impacted areas who have been bolstered by colleagues from the south and east of the country, as well as skilled retirees,” said the company which is majority-owned by the government.
ESB also has more than 1,300 support staff involved in overseeing damage assessment, emergency call management, logistics and network operations.
“Our customer contact centre has also doubled its resources to accommodate the unprecedented high volumes of calls, resulting in short call response times throughout the day and night for our customers,” it added.
ESB has urged people to be aware of the dangers posed by fallen electricity infrastructure, particularly in the worst impacted areas of the country.
“If you come across fallen wires or damaged electricity network, never, ever touch or approach these as they are live and extremely dangerous.
“Please report any damage to electricity infrastructure by calling 1800 372 999,” ESB added.
Water supplies
Meanwhile many people are also without access to a water supply tonight in the aftermath of Storm Éowyn.
But Uisce Éireann said its crews are making “further progress in restoring water supply to customers”.
Uisce Éireann’s Kevin Love said that there is a continuing focus on working with the ESB to prioritise power restoration to treatment plants and pumping stations in impacted areas.
“We are working in co-ordination with the National Emergency Co-ordination Group, the ESB and other agencies to ensure all available resources are being deployed to support the return of water supplies.
“We would like to thank all the agencies and contractors involved in helping us source and deploy generators; we now have these generators in place in nearly all locations where they can be deployed.
“Our priority now is to ensure the restoration of electricity to our plants and pumping stations that are running on generators or remain without power because connection to a generator is simply not possible,” he said.