Power rationed in Cotabato areas due to fallen pylon

COTABATO City, Philippines—This city and its nearby provinces are without power after a steel tower of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines collapsed after a river in North Cotabato overflowed early Monday.

Cotabato Light and Power Company (Colight) manager Crisente Ferolino said the whole franchise area of Colight has been without power from NGCP since at 5 a.m.

The fallen steel pylon carries the 69 KV line from Kabacan to Simuay Substation that supplies Cotabato City and Maguindanao with power.

“We are rationing the electricity to city residents,” Ferolino said.

The Lumayong river in Kabacan, North Cotabato, overflows every time heavy rains occur in Bukidnon and North Cotabato.

“The transmission tower was located beside the Lumayong river and it fell early Monday, which also affected a nearby transmission tower,” the NGCP said in a statement.

“NGCP workers are rushing [to repair] the tower so power can be restored immediately,” it added.

Normally, when power from Kabacan-Simuay transmission line is off or out of service, Colight gets its supply from the NGCP Tacurong substation.

But Ferolino said the Tacurong substation was also having trouble such that it could not provide extra power to Maguindanao Electric Cooperative and Cotabato City.

Using its standby generators, Colight could only supply about 50 percent of the whole franchise area, which comprise about 300,000 households, according to Ferolino.

He could not say when the NGCP could fully restore power supply.

“In the meantime, we ration electricity so everybody can at least have power for four or five hours today,” Ferolino said.