By ANNELIA NIXON

Tribune Business Reporter

anixon@tribunemedia.net

Mayaguana and Harbour Island were both hit with island-wide power outages yesterday leaving businesses struggling to cope with serving their customers.

Blaming the outage on a generation unit overheating, Bahamas Power & Light (BPL) yesterday evening said Mayaguana will not see electricity restored until this morning. It did not provide a specific time timeline but said it was “mobilising additional generation personnel from our Long Island operation to assist with the necessary repairs”.

“Bahamas Power and Light Company (BPL) advises the public that at approximately 1.25 pm today, the island of Mayaguana experienced a full island-wide outage due to overheating in one of our generation units,” BPL said in a statement.

“BPL’s operations team has identified the issue and is currently mobilising additional generation personnel from our Long Island operations to assist with the necessary repairs. Based on the current assessment, power restoration is expected by tomorrow morning.”

Meanwhile, Harbour’s Island’s outage was said to be due to an over-voltage fault. BPL added that most of the island saw electricity restored within a few hours. The Government-owned entity thanked hotels on Harbour Island who cut back on their demand to lessen the load on the grid.

“At approximately 12.12pm today, Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) experienced an island-wide outage in Harbour Island after the rental generation units provided by Aggreko tripped offline due to an over-voltage fault,” said BPL.

“Technical teams were immediately dispatched and restoration efforts began shortly thereafter. As of 2pm, the majority of the island has been restored, with remaining areas expected to come online as work continues.

“This outage comes as BPL continues broader work on Harbour Island to address recurring generation and distribution issues. This includes co-ordination with technical specialists and efforts to improve overall system stability. We are especially grateful to the hotels on the island that are assisting by reducing their demand on the grid during this time, helping to ease the load as we work to restore power and stabilise supply.”

Donna Whitfield, manager of Princess Street Gallery in Harbour Island, voiced relief that the outage - which she said presented itself as a “brown out” - occurred during low customer traffic. She added that her business usually closes around 1pm for lunch and, by the time she got back to work, power had been restored. 

“We have a generator that we turn on when we feel like the period’s been long enough,” Ms Whitfield said. “I think the pullback is, at least in the last few days when it has gone off, it comes right back on. So I think ideally, what we’re hoping is, if it needs to stay off, just leave it. But they don’t. It just kind of goes up and down, up and down. So every five to 10 minutes, it went off today for probably around six or seven times.

“But today it was just kind of up and down. I think that the one thing that people are concerned with here in general is when the power ruins all of your electronics. Even just basic refrigerators and things like that. But air conditioning also. Air conditioners also incur this particular type of problem,” she added.

“Sometimes it just feels like a brown out. Like it dips and then it comes right back up. But a lot of times, it just shuts off. There’s no, I think if you live on Harbour Island, you can probably tell by the sounds your equipment is making that the power is about to go off. But then today it was just up and down, on and off, on and off, on and off.”

Karen Catalayn, a spa owner also based in Harbour Island, said she is grateful that her business is shaded by two almond trees. Se added that the trees help to keep her establishment and customers cool during outages. However, in preparation for the summer, Ms Catalyn is planning on connecting her spa to the 47 kilowatt generator stationed next door at her family’s hotel, Tingum Village Hotel.

While Eleutherans have been battling power outages for years, husband and wife owners of the Mayaguana-based, Majon Bed Bath & Breakfast, Mario and Gina Murphy, stated that such an extended power cut is rare for the island.

They told Tribune Business that their three-bedroom bed, bath and breakfast is currently housing one guest who has been “very understanding”. Mr and Mrs Murphy said they will try to make their guest as comfortable as they can during the outage.

“I spoke to her,” Mr Murphy said. “She’s quite understandable, coming from Nassau. But I have some portable lights. She has a gas stove. It’s quite comfortable, but she’s very understanding. Let’s just pray and hope it don’t go beyond in the morning.”