City of Johannesburg Emergency Management Services (EMS) firefighters have managed to extinguish a fire that broke out at the Central Substation in the CBD.
According to authorities, this is the third fire at the substation and has caused power outages in Marshalltown and surrounding areas.
The incident comes as City Power was finishing repairs from the earlier incidents.
According to EMS spokesperson Xolile Khumalo, the incident was reported before 06:00 this morning.
“Emergency personnel are currently on scene attending to the incident. No injuries have been reported so far.
“Residents and road users are requested to steer clear of the area to allow City officials and emergency personnel to carry out their duties,” said Khumalo.
City Power said its operators are awaiting the smoke to subside before they can safely enter the affected sections and assess the extent of the damage.
The entity highlighted that it was nearing completion of the restoration process following the second fire earlier this month.
“By Friday, 25 September, approximately 98% of the network affected by that fire had been restored, with only a limited number of distributors still undergoing repairs.
“The recurrence of fires at the same critical facility, within weeks of each other and while extensive repairs are underway, is a serious concern for City Power,” explained the entity’s spokesperson, Isaac Mangena.
Furthermore, Mangena said that while the cause of today’s fire has yet to be established, “the sequence of incidents will form an important part of the investigation into what has been happening around Central Substation and the underground electricity network.”
Meanwhile, City Power Acting Chief Executive Officer Charles Tlouane said the recurrence of incidents at Central Substation cannot be viewed in isolation.
“We are extremely concerned by what appears to be a sequence of incidents affecting the same critical electricity infrastructure within a very short period.
“Our teams have spent weeks repairing extensive damage and were close to completing the restoration of the network when another fire occurred.
“While we will not speculate on the cause of this latest incident before the necessary investigations are completed, the pattern and timing of these fires are deeply concerning and require a thorough investigation,” said Tlouane.
The second fire occurred on 9 September, just a few hours after City Power had restored electricity supply the previous evening following an initial outage reported on 6 September.
Preliminary indications at the time suggested that it may have been linked to theft and vandalism of electrical infrastructure within the underground cable tunnels. However, the cause remains subject to a formal investigation.