Minister congratulates power workers for mighty effort

Mines and Energy Minister Geoff Wilson told State Parliament today that the response from Energex and Ergon Energy to last week’s series of violent storms was magnificent.

“I want to acknowledge the professionalism and dedication of the field crews, the staff in contact centres taking calls for help, staff in control centres, and others out in the hubs, planning and delivering what can only be described as an unbelievable recovery effort,” Mr Wilson said.

“As a resident of the north-western suburbs, I personally witnessed many Energex workers on the job for many hours, knowing that their own families and homes were without power or flooded.

“Words cannot convey my admiration for what they did. They put the needs of others above their own and the massive size of the task they achieved is hard to comprehend,” he said.

Around 365,000 homes and businesses had lost power since the first storm struck on Sunday. By Friday morning, just 60 homes were awaiting reconnection.

“An Energex worker best summed up the extreme nature of Sunday’s storm when he described it as the worst storm he’d encountered in over a quarter of a century.”

“More than 6,000 lightning strikes were recorded at the height of the storm with wind gusts up to 130 kilometres an hour, heavy rain and hail,” he said.

Ergon Energy crews also worked around the clock repairing power lines and restoring power on the Darling Downs, the South Burnett, the Fraser Coast, and Central Queensland.

“It’s not a nine to five job, and as we’ve all seen this past week, it can be hazardous. For that alone, we owe them our thanks,” he said.

“We’ve all learnt from this past week that when summer storms strike, it’s not a matter of if we lose power but when. And it was good to know that Energex and Ergon were ready for action, ready to tackle whatever nature threw at the state’s electricity network.

“That’s simply because good governments, responsible governments, plan for the future,” he said.

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