Blasts blamed for power outage in Mindanao

DAVAO CITY – The series of bombings of the transmission towers of the National Transmission Corp. was blamed for the total power outage that struck some parts of Mindanao midnight Sunday.

Of the five transmission towers that were supposed to bring power from the main power grid at the Agus power plants to various parts of Mindanao, particularly Southern, Northern and Eastern Mindanao, only one is reportedly now functioning.

It was cited the bombing over the weekend of another Transco tower in Lanao del Norte resulted to the three-hour service disruption yesterday.

Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels were believed to be behind the series of bombings of Transco towers in Northern Mindanao.

According to Transco Southeastern Mindanao manager Adolfo Manager, the bombings have become a big problem because these have lessened the actual number of towers that are supposed to be used.

Transco likewise blamed the strong winds and rains brought about by typhoon Niña as having triggered the automatic tripping of the Lugait-Tagoloan 138 kilovolt line in Mindanao, which supplies power to central, northeastern and southern parts of the island.

According to Transco Mindanao Vice President Engineer Lorrymir Adasa, the protection system in place on the line detected an abnormality, most likely contact with vegetation due to strong winds, and automatically tripped the Lugait side of the Lugait-Tagoloan 138 kv transmission line at 12:01 am but was restored 19 minutes after.

Adasa added the supply side going to Davao Area was restored about two hours later after TransCo successfully dealt with the power circuit breaker problem in Tagoloan at 12:08 a.m.. However, supply to General Santos City was restored at 3:54 a.m.; to Butuan City, Surigao and Agusan Provinces, 4:45 a.m.; and to Cagayan de Oro City and Misamis Oriental Province, at 7:30 a.m.

Adasa also met other Mindanao Transco officials yesterday and discussed the partial system blackout to include remedial measures to the reduced power transmission capacity of the lines which sourced supply from the Agus hydro plants to Cagayan de Oro, Surigao, Davao and General Santos areas.      – With Ramil Bajo