NEWS & UPDATES

KUCHING

26 MARCH 2023

Vandalism was identified to be the primary cause of a supply interruption affecting multiple areas in Petra Jaya on Saturday (25 March 2023) at approximately 9:15 PM.

Areas affected were Medan Raya, Kampung Sungai Bedil, Bukit Siol, Jalan Astana, Che Buyong, Jalan Hashim Jaafar, Jalan Merdeka, Kampung Lintang, Arked Mara, Ava Astana, and Astana Housing.

Most areas were restored by 12:15 AM with the first area at Dewan Bahasa & Pustaka restored by 10:40 PM the same night. The remaining areas received power by 3:00AM, except for Sungai Bedil, which was successfully restored at noon today (Sunday) after the cable faults were rectified.

Upon receiving outage reports, Syarikat SESCO Berhad (SESCO), Sarawak Energy’s operations and retail arm, immediately deployed its technical team to assess the situation and begin round-the-clock repair works.

SESCO had deployed mobile gensets to provide backup supply to customers in the affected areas, restoring supply to most quarters, with the exception of the Sungai Bedil area, which has accessibility issues due to narrow and congested access roads.

A thorough investigation found that the root cause of the outage was due to a high-tension main cable that had been cut by vandals outside the Astana fencing during Earth Hour on

Saturday night. The high fault (excessive flow) current caused by the irresponsible act of vandalism resulted in cascading fault at two cable joints.

Sarawak Energy apologises for any inconvenience this outage may have caused its customers.

To address the challenges of ageing cable joints, Nazry Abdul Latip, Sarawak Energy Regional Manager (Western Region) said, “We have an ongoing plan to reinforce the supply to Petra Jaya, which includes laying new high-tension cables and installing motorised switchgears to speed up restoration. Ageing cable joints will be replaced through the reinforcement project.”.

Sarawak Energy is dedicated to ensuring the swift and safe restoration of electricity supply to all affected customers, prioritising the safety of their personnel and the public. To achieve this, the company has invested significantly in technology, back-up supply, and infrastructure to develop a more modern, efficient, and reliable power system.

Additionally, its technical teams are on high alert and standby 24 hours a day, ready for immediate restoration during both localised and major outages. The focus is to restore power supply to customers as quickly as possible, utilising alternative feeder or supply sources if applicable, before focusing on repair works.

Members of the public can contact Sarawak Energy 24/7 Customer Care Centre at 1300-88-3111, email customercare@sarawakenergy.com or utilise Sarawak Energy mobile app SEB Cares to report outages to assist in speedy restoration of electricity supply or report any suspicious activities near its facilities.

Repair works ongoing at night

High-tension cable that had been deliberately damaged by vandals

Source of the outage – vandalised high-tension cable

Extensive repair works being carried out to fix the faulty underground cable joints.

Fault repair at another repair site