St. Croix residents can ignore the V.I. Water and Power Authority’s prediction of resumed power rotations for the weekend and instead look forward to full power.
In a Wednesday evening statement, Raymond George, executive director of the V.I. Water and Power Authority, said the utility will not rotate electrical feeders this weekend. At a WAPA board meeting Wednesday, George said he expects Feeders 10 and 11 to be at full capacity on Saturday.
George said Feeder 17, which was supplied by Alathron, a French licensee for General Electric, has an engineer from France on site to make needed repairs to the unit. A control card for the unit is expected to arrive on Friday, George said, making the unit available for the weekend also.
WAPA’s problems began just after 5 p.m. on Sunday, July 11 when an electrical short developed on high voltage cables at the Richmond substation and tripped the operating generators and desalinization units. The mishap forced St. Croix into an island-wide outage followed by the feeder rotation.
George said diesel fuel made its way into the substation’s duct bank, which caused the insulation to deteriorate.
The rotation, which cut power to areas around the island on a rotating basis for at least two-hour intervals, lasted a week. Last weekend WAPA was able to hold off on the rotations as well.
Although all four of WAPA’s desalination plants will be on line Saturday, George said the utility will continue to ration potable water so it can build up water reserves for hurricanes.