July 10, 2008 — Problems with equipment at the Randolph Harley Power Plant have forced the V.I. Water and Power Authority to rotate power on St. Thomas until 10 p.m. Thursday, and possibly into Friday if the authority is not able to bring enough generating units back online.
Feeder 7A, servicing Caret Bay, Mafolie, Solberg, parts of Mahogany Run, Mountain Top and parts of Ridge Road, will be out until 6 p.m.
Feeder 9A, servicing Back Street, Main Street, parts of Subbase, parts of Government Hill and parts of Frenchtown, and 9C, servicing Bovoni and Nadir, will be without power from 6 to 8 p.m., according to WAPA spokeswoman Cassandra Dunn.
Feeder 10B, servicing parts of Frenchman's Bay, Havensight and the West Indian Co. Ltd, and 7D, servicing most of Smith Bay and Red Hook, will be without power from 8 to 10 p.m., she said.
At 3:15 a.m. Thursday, WAPA experienced a fault on gas-turbine Unit No. 18, which resulted in a total shutdown of the Harley Power Plant and outages that affected St. Thomas and St John. Service was restored to most of the affected feeders around 8 a.m., but difficulties with other units forced WAPA to begin rotating power early Thursday afternoon.
As of 5 p.m., crews were still troubleshooting Unit 18, and were having difficulty bringing up Unit No. 23, Dunn said
"This is the workhorse — without this unit, we can't accommodate the load for our customers," she said. "That why we have instituted the rotating power."
WAPA has also had problems with its 774-1424 emergency number to the St. Thomas line department. Customers can contact WAPA by calling 774-3552 and pressing 0 or 4 to reach the line department, according to a WAPA news release.
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