Storm damage leaves 1695 homes without power across North Island

Power remains out to many places in the Western Bay of Plenty this morning. Photo / Powerco

Field crews are working to restore power across the North Island, including the Bay of Plenty, after the weekend’s storm left thousands in the dark.

In an update this morning, Powerco said crews will be out from first light working to fix damage and restore power supply to customers affected by the weekend’s storm event.

As at 6am Monday, 1695 Powerco customers in the North Island were without supply.

The majority of these outages were in the western Bay of Plenty.

Powerco head of network operations Mark Dunn said power was restored to about 4000 customers in and around Whangamatā on Sunday evening.

A photo taken of damage to a section of line north of Whangamatā. Photo / Powerco

“Thank you for your patience and understanding as our crews work as quickly and safely as they can to restore power to all customers affected by these high winds.

“We know it’s hard to be without power, and we will do everything we can to get as many customers restored as quickly as possible, but this storm has caused damage in a lot of different locations.

“For that reason, it’s important that, if you are affected by an outage because of storm damage, you prepare to be without power overnight.

“While we have had extra crews join the restoration on Sunday, we have multiple poles and lines down in a number of locations. We will be doing all we can with the technology we have in place to minimise the outage areas; however, we will need time to make repairs to physical damage, such as restringing long sections of broken lines.”