09 July 2004 00:00 All storm-affected customers back on power in Central Networks region

Central Networks, the electricity distribution business for the East and West Midlands, has today (JULY 9) confirmed that all storm-affected customers are back on power.

Almost 700 engineers worked round the clock to deal with 690 faults directly caused by Wednesday’s freak summer storm in both the East and West Midlands. It is now believed that more than 150,000 customers were affected at one time or another on Wednesday and Thursday.

Bob Taylor, Managing Director of Central Networks, said: “Our engineers did a fantastic job across the region – with co-operation between the East and West patches working extremely well.

“Our priority now is to carry out full repairs to all areas of our network that were damaged by the storm.

“We’ll also be removing the emergency generators we had to bring in to some areas out once the network is repaired and getting everyone back to normal.”

Central Networks will be sending up a helicopter to patrol the lines south of Birmingham today, with the north of the West Midlands patrolled yesterday.

Ends

Notes to editors:
• Central Networks is the new name for Midlands Electricity and East Midlands Electricity. The company brings power to 4.8 million customers across the East and West Midlands through 133,000km of underground and overhead cables and via almost 97,000 substations;
• Central Networks covers an area from the Peak District in the north to the suburbs of Bristol in the south, and from the Welsh Borders to the Lincolnshire Coast.

For more information contact:
Jonathan Smith on 024 7642 5741
Out of hours, ring 024 7642 4000 and ask to speak to the duty press officer