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A significant slip near two Transpower towers carrying electricity to Northland has remained stable, with no further land movement. The slip is located about 10km south-west of Wellsford and impacts one tower on the Henderson to Marsden 220kV line and one tower on the Henderson to Maungatapere 110kV line.
Last week, Warkworth residents were being advised to take precautions in case there were unplanned interruptions to power when the 110kV line was taken down. This was done in case the slip advanced causing it to fall onto the 220kV line, as this would have resulted in an extended outage to areas from Warkworth north. The 220kV line was being relocated last week to bypass the tower in the impacted area, an interim step to improve security while Transpower worked on a permanent solution.
Transpower general manager grid delivery Mark Ryall says that while there is still a very small risk of an extended outage due to the slip advancing, an outage during the construction of the temporary bypass would most likely be caused by lightning or other equipment failure.
“Depending on the cause, we would expect to be able to restore power relatively quickly – a few minutes to a matter of hours,” he says. “In the unlikely case a tower was to fail due to the slip, then we envisage at this stage having a circuit available within 48-72 hours. However small this risk, we continue to encourage residents in the region to be prepared for an extended outage.”
