KARACHI, May 29: The transmission and distribution system of the KESC limped back to normality on Wednesday, recovering from Tuesday night’s massive power breakdown which had plunged almost the entire city into darkness.

People calling the Dawn office said they learnt about the power breakdown through evening newspapers because nearly all complaint centres of the KESC had left their phones either unattended or off the hook.

Ghulam Ali, a resident of PECHS, Block 6, said telephone lines at the 118 had been incessantly busy after 3.30am. “It was extremely frustrating to find 118 continuously engaged. I not only wanted to lodge a complaint about the power breakdown but also wanted to know why we had the power cut. Now that I know that the KESC had been in the throes of a massive power breakdown last night, I can well imagine that 118 must have been inundated with phone calls. But either 118 should increase the number of telephone lines or at least install a call-waiting facility.”

A KESC spokesman said the power utility had normalized the power supply to the city which had remained interrupted the previous night due to the snapping of two 220-KVA extra high-tension circuits from the Bin Qasim power station to the Pipri grid.

“Working continuously for 17 hours since last night the KESC generation and transmission engineers have normalized the supply. The snapped extra high-tension transmission lines have been linked and the Bin Qasim power has started supplying the required power.”

He said that the first fault had occurred at 10.22am Tuesday night but had been controlled within half an hour. “Again at about 2.20am with the snapping of the second extra high-tension line the Bin Qasim power station safety switches were shut off the station. Immediately supplies from the Water and Power Development Authority were increased from 280 megawatts to 650 megawatts. At the time, the KESC had 696 megawatts from Korangi Thermal power station, local independent power producers, Kanupp and Pakistan Steel.”

He added that the shortage of 650 megawatts at 3.50am had been overcome through loadshedding .

The spokesman observed that the sudden breakdowns might occur in any power supply system but the difficulty faced by the KESC in catering to the city demand was shortage of generation, single sources of supply and single-line distribution system.