Grand Cayman suffers 5-hour blackout
CUC staff at work
(CNS): Most of CUC’s customers were without power through the night and into the morning Thursday-Friday as a result of a fault on the power provider’s Transmission and Distribution (T&D) system, officials confirmed. The blackout began just before 11pm on Thursday night but it was not until after 5:15 Friday morning that all customers were once again receiving electricity. Parts of George Town were re-connected by around 2:30am but the rest of Grand Cayman remained in darkness.
“CUC’s crews have been working as quickly as possible to restore power to all customers in a safe manner,” a spokesperson stated following the major power disruption. “CUC sincerely apologizes for the inconvenience caused to customers affected by this outage.”
Fortunately, Thursday-Friday night was quite cool, with temperatures falling into the low 70’s, according to the weather services, as a result of the north-easterly winds over the Cayman area.
Category: Local News
Who cares about blackouts? You should be grateful to have electricity while some billions people who don’t have any electricity at all….Africa, India, South America……..
The prices that this monopoly charges for power consumption comes with certain expectations from its customers.
The two continents and sub-continent that you speak off, don’t believe for one minute that they don’t have the money to fix the problem – it’s about priorities. If India can find the money to successfully develop and launch a orbiter to Mars in 2013, they can also solve a simple power issue.
This was terrible!
Please FIX this! New supplies! We already paying enough to fund them!
Cayman has a fantastic 1st world electricity service. Be grateful.
As the lights went out Thursday night and the island went dark, I didn’t give it much thought at the time but reflecting back on it now since it was for a prolonged period, some 5+hrs.
I’ve concluded that CUC really knows how to get into this BLACK FRIDAY thing or should I say “BLACKOUT FRIDAY” and Thursday too as the power went down from 11pm Thursday night and didn’t come back on until after 4am Friday morn.(in the W/Bay area)
I wonder if this is another of their series of “spurious faults” as they again, haven’t really said what went wrong, just a “problem” in their T&D system, which could be one in a million things, so to speak, I think we could figure out that much on our own! They could surely use some brushing up in their PR dept.
However, since it was Thanksgiving period, I gave thanks for the good moonlight and relative cool night otherwise it would’ve been miserable. Kinda took me back to the period after Ivan or back in the good ole days of Cayman!
Ps: the power also went out for a short period during the day on Friday and again for a couple of hrs early Sat morn in WB. CUC really owes their customers a real explanation!
The explanation you get from CUC would be in your next bill. They don’t care about consumers, just the dollars.
And it continued into Saturday! What gives CUC?
Another power outage again tonight in West Bay. What is going on CUC?
And again tonight… I wonder why Singapore has done so well, they don’t have power outages. Given Finance and the legal work from this is such a big part of Cayman’s wealth it would not surprise me to see a slow, but sure, decline given that such fundemental needs are not being met by CUC. Where is Barclays, Where is HSBC, Where is parts of RBS, amongst others? I wonder how many more will upticks and leave…? Tourism alone isn’t gonna crack it folks…
The phrase, ‘Couldn’t get drunk in a brewery’, springs to mind…
And again…
It was the gay gays that did this
How about I sincerely apologize for being unable to pay my bill. Unfortunately it does not work that way.
This company just like the lack of leadership in this country can kiss my “ask me no question”
FED UP!
Regarding the 5 hour power outage.
I have lived here for 26 years.
It is really strange when the power goes out and interrupts our comfortable lifestyle. This happened last night just as the evening ended. Fortunately I was going to sleep anyway.
I went through Ivan and that was hell!
However it was cool last night by local standards. Perfect timing. Better than if it was September in the high heat and high humidity.
Power was restored by 5:45 – I was awake and watching.
Please remember that this sleepy little paradise only got full time electrical service in the 60’s!
We are blessed with a good power supply most of the time and I think CUC does fine considering….
Yes it is expensive power but overall very reliable and a quick visit to any neighboring Caribbean island will reveal that we are lucky to have this reliable l u x u r y in this wonderful island paradise…
Alvin
Tough call, that!!
are we going to see a deduction in our bills due to this blackout… I wouldn’t hold my breath
Dat nah nuttin. If we had solar power it would be off all night every night.
Right that’s it, I’m sick and tired of CUC poor reliability. I’m switching power companies………oh wait!
Blackout Friday
Totally unacceptable CUC! Especially for the prices we pay.
I don’t know who is giving worse service – CUC or Flow!!!
Seriously that is not even a question. Flow by a country mile!
CNS … Please take note that all power was not restored until 9:23am …. Anyone off Easterly Tibbetts between Lakeside and Harquial Theater was without power til then. Shame on CUC …. Goes to show even more why we need Competition
Between Lakeside and Harquail you say? So The National Gallery then. They weren’t open.
Until the technology of wireless transmission of power (HINT: Nikola Tesla’s “lost” discoveries) we will not have meaningful “competition” in power. The entire competitive system in communication was done with WIRELESS technology. As long as the ONE company owns the entire distribution and transmission system, competition in the power industry is an illusion!
There may be other power producers, but the failure of the transmission lines will still cause system-wide outages. That is, until CUC actually IMPLEMENTS a working load balancing/shedding system to isolate local faults from “SCRAMMING” the entire network every time. They’ve been telling us it has been DONE for years, but the truth is in the (piss poor) performance!!
I like the above comment… at least once a year….. sounds tough princess.
Unfortunately this is the price we pay for living on this beautiful island. There will always be risks involved. man made machines can always fail, electrical circuits fail….it could have been a human error but it could also have been mechanical error. Who knows! BUT as long as they work hard to restore power (and their profits) we will be forever grateful. It was maybe a little inconvenience for some but come on, it wasnt the end of the world like half of you are making out! If you have some deep issues with CUC, turn off your electrical supply, buy a generator and purchase propane or gas and there you go. your problems will be fixed! or will they?…..now that’s third world folks…….
The prices we pay we should have a lot better, and a little less for those fatcat directors. It’s the usual tale of monopoly and greed is all.
hey CUC how about when there is a disruption of service that is your fault you credit every household/business affected $25 and the $5 for every hour the power is out…….
so CUC how about when you have a disruption of service that is your fault you credit every affected household/business $25 and $5 for every hour it is out…….
There is a little thing in existence called inflatable solar light,”Luci”. It truly is amazing and should be free of custom duty in the light of the regular outages in Grand Cayman.
All alternative energy systems and components are duty free.
What, you have a Luci and she’s inflatable? I think you’re posting in the wrong forum mate.
CUC/CNS – More details on the fault please. Given the size of the blackout we’re all interested to know the details.
It was at least 6.5 hours at my house. Thanks a lot Bin Laden!!
Great timing, missed the foruth quarter of the Packers vs Bears game…
CUC’s service is getting very thirld worldish.
You obviously haven’t been to the third world or even the second world………..
I lived several years in Jamaica.
10:35 I’ve been to many so called “third world” countries and I’m sorry to burst your bubble but as far as utility services go for the prices we pay. The “third world” countries are far better with the power outage ratio than here.
With first world costs…
Actually I am currently visiting a first world country and its actually way, way, WAY cheaper here and we don’t have blackouts
‘We apologise for any inconvenience caused, which was as a result of Cayman having the wrong kind of power company’
Our electricity just isn’t gay enough.
The gays did this!
The Christian Gays, or the Atheist Gays?
well I hope that the time the power was out is deducted from our bills.. I won’t hold my breath
It is…you get billed for consumption not hourly
Yes, but continuity of service is very important and it IS included in fee, even if it is not listed separately.
Growing pains that could be easy solved if we stop putting a serious strain on our infrastructure by having sensible immigration policies and stop depending on revenue collected from work permit fees. Blackouts now are becoming more and more common in Cayman and we are getting more like third world jurisdictions.
Because we all know immigrants use massive amounts of power starting at 11pm on Thursdays…….
lol!! It’s ze expats fault!
Well done! You amused three people!
Except, at 11pm at night, its unlikely this was an ‘over-demand’ blackout. So please contain your illogical xenophobia.
Thanks CUC for our very own Black Friday!
As Thanksgiving finished, we were all reminded to count our blessings! Thank God it was a relatively cool evening. That’s what I thought when I was lighting candles and taking out battery operated lanterns and flashlights.
It was so cool we fell asleep even though the electricity was off. No way we would have been able to sleep in the summer heat. Thank God!
I’m just seeing the positives in the midst of discomfort. I don’t mean to minimize anyone else’s discomfort during this outage. Thank God it was fixed.
Is god an electrician?
He sure is. He made electricity. It is known as lightening. Thunder follows. Haha.
“CUC sincerely apologizes for the inconvenience caused to customers affected by this outage.”
I am getting a little tired of hearing this company line every time we have an outage!!! It seems we have an island-wide outage at least once a year. Geesh.
I’ve had a power outage every month this year. Actually, that is an improvement on last year…!
a year? come on its more than that