Veld fires trip Sebenza substation causing Johannesburg outages

What happened

On 19 August 2024 City Power reported that the Sebenza Substation tripped because of veld fires. The outage affected customers in parts of Alexandra, the inner city, Midrand and areas served by the Reuven Service Delivery Centre. Johannesburg Emergency Services attended to extinguish the fire beneath the transmission station. City Power operators were dispatched to restore supply once the fire was contained. The duration of the outage was not confirmed at the time of the announcement. City Power advised that regular updates would be issued to customers and cautioned residents against actions that contribute to veld fires. The company apologised for the inconvenience caused.

Contributing factors

Veld fires in the vicinity of the substation.

Lessons learned

1. Maintain regular vegetation management around substation perimeters to reduce external fire exposure.
2. Establish rapid response protocols with local emergency services for fire events near grid assets.
3. Provide timely public updates during outages to minimise customer impact.

Source

News24 (news24.com)