A prolonged power breakdown hit major cities of the country including Lahore on Thursday causing huge problems for the domestic users.
According to details, a fire broke out at the main transformer of Guddu Thermal Power House in Kashmore which was the main cause of the power failure. In several parts of the city, the power outage continued for over ten hours.
The power outage further compounded the suffering of citizens as they had already been facing gas load shedding since the start of the winter season.
Mangla, Tarbela and Ghazi Barotha power stations were shut down due to a fault in 500KV transmission line at the Guddu Power plant, which forced a power breakdown in Lahore, Rawalpindi, Attock, Faisalabad and other major cities of the province. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and northern areas Pakistan also remained without electricity. The National Assembly of Pakistan was not spared the power failure either as a session of the assembly was in progress. The National Assembly speaker asked to initiate an inquiry into the matter.
A doctor performing his duty in Mayo Hospital Lahore told Pakistan Today that the hospital was also hit by power failure and there was no electricity in several wards for as many as five hours. The largest trauma centre of the province normally enjoys exemption from load shedding but Thursday’s power failure affected the hospital as well.
The doctor said that the power generators also gave out after a few hours after they ran through the fuel during the prolonged power outage. The machines in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) also stopped working due to non-availability of electricity and X-rays of patients could not be carried out either.
Rana Abdul Rehman Khan, a lawyer by profession told this scribe that he had to prepare his cases for the next day but was unable to do that as his UPS was out of charge. “There is no gas in the stoves and now, there is no electricity either. I wonder where this country is going as the basic necessities of life can suddenly vanish here,” he lamented.
Mushtaq Ali, who runs a photocopy shop at Nabha Road near the AG office, told this scribe that his business suffered a lot because of the power failure. “I run my shop in the area where people from all parts of the province travel to, as important offices like Lahore High Court, AG office and GPO are located in the locality but many of them returned today because they could not get a photocopy made of their documents because of the power outage,” he said, and added that he has an alternative source of electricity in the form of a power generator but that continuous working of the generator could harm its future performance and, therefore, he had to refuse service to the customers.
Bashir Khan, a resident of old anarkali who was going to mosque to offer prayer, told this scribe that he could not perform ablution because there was no water in the mosque. He said that announcements were made from the loudspeakers of the mosques in the area asking people to come to the mosque after performing ablutions.
An official from the Ministry of Water and Power told Pakistan Today on condition of anonymity, as he was not authorised to speak to media, that an inquiry had been initiated by the Ministry to ascertain the cause of fire at the Guddu power plant.
Electricity was restored in some parts of the city in the evening but several areas were remained without power until late at night.
LESCO Chief Executive Officer Qaiser Zaman was not available for comment despite repeated attempts.
