Yesterday’s Power Outage in Parts of S’pore Was Caused by a Fire

If you were in Ang Mo Kio, Bishan, Sin Ming or Thomson yesterday, you might suddenly realise that the Wifi wasn’t working.

What you didn’t realise was that the lights were off as well, air-conditioners suddenly stopped working and the frozen meat in your freezer was starting to thaw.

For almost 1.5 hour yesterday, people in parts of Singapore were left without electricity from 1:30 p.m. to 2:58 p.m.

Here’s what happened.

Power Outage on the Northeast of Singapore

At 1:54 p.m. yesterday, SP Group posted an update on their Facebook Page:

In case you can’t read:

Electricity supply to parts of Singapore was disrupted today. Our officers were immediately activated and our priority is to restore supply as quickly and safely as possible.

We are investigating the cause of the incident.

We will provide more updates on our social media channels.

According to various reports and residents in the area, the power outage has started as early as 1:30 p.m., which meant people were kept in the dark (literally) for about 24 minutes.

Power was progressively restored from 1:46 p.m. (yeah, that’s before they made the announcement on Facebook) and by 2:58 p.m., they were fully restored.

If you think it’s just inconvenience, think again: it was dangerous, too, because everything nowadays runs on electricity.

Lifts & Traffic Lights Not Working

According to multiple reports, there were people who were stuck in lifts. I can’t imagine the fear those people must’ve had: would it free fall? What’s happening outside? When would they be rescued?

In addition, traffic lights along the area allegedly didn’t work, too. Anyone who drives would go apeshit because even someone who drives for a living would be confused on whether it’s safe to drive through a junction.

Power Outage Due to a Fire in a Substation in Bright Hill

The power outage was due to a fire in a substation.

According to the trusty Wikipedia, a substation is “part of an electrical generation, transmission, and distribution system.”

There are smaller substations that you might be familiar with if you live in HDBs, like this:

It’s unknown if the substation that caught fire is a bigger one or how it looks like.

The SCDF was alerted to the fire at 1:30 p.m. and extinguish the fire within 10 minutes. However, one fireman was injured due to smoke inhalation and was taken to Singapore General Hospital.

Energy Market Authority isn’t Happy

From 1 January 2019, the Open Electricity Market was launched in “Zone 2” which comprises areas that have postal codes which start with 53 to 57, 79 to 80 and 82 to 83.

And this power outage happened in this area.

Surely it would have dampened the confidence of some residents.

The Energy Market Authority, a statutory board under the Ministry of Trade and Industry of Singapore that also ensures a reliable and secure energy supply, said that they take a serious view of “electricity supply disruptions” and they would work with “the energy industry to take appropriate measures, so as to minimise the risk of such a disruption from taking place again.”

It’s unknown if the power outage affects every electricity retailer or just SP Group.

Nevertheless, EMA, SP Group and SCDF are now investigating the incident.