[WATCH] Enemalta engineers repair first of three cables damaged in Kappara distribution centre fire

Wednesday's power outage caused by fault in 33kv cables

Report by Andrea Rossitto

Enemalta staff were working hard to fix the damage caused to the electricity grid by a fire on Wednesday, and had in fact managed to fix one of three damaged cables, after working all night and into early Thursday morning.

Network maintenance engineer Joseph Vassallo told MaltaToday that three 33kv cables and an interconnector cable were damaged in the fire in a tunnel beneath the Kappara distribution centre. The circuit breakers on site had to be switched off, causing power cuts for several consumers.

Vassallo said that the damage to the cables took place some 600 metres into the tunnel, and confirmed that the interruption to the national power grid resulted from a fault in Enemalta’s 33kv cables.

“Following the fires, engineers, Civil Protection Department fire fighters and other officials acted swiftly and made their way inside the tunnel to put out any fire, check the infrastructure within and ensure that the whereabouts were safe,” he said.

He added that the repaired feeder had already been switched on and was electricity supply as usual.

Video is unavailable at this time.

The electricity outage was first reported in San Gwann and surrounding localities at around 10:20am. Although electricity was restored within 30 minutes in several localities, Sliema included, power was suspended once again as a fire alarm informed Enemalta engineers of a fire inside the tunnel.

In comments to the press on site, minister Konrad Mizzi - who retains oversight for energy despite no longer being energy minister – said there were indications that a fire had taken place inside the tunnel at Kappara.

The minister took the opportunity to remind the press of the importance of having a diversified energy mix that does not depend solely on the Malta-Sicily interconnector.