Several parts of Gurugram faced massive power outage on Friday evening after a fire broke out following a fault in the main transformer at the 220 KV power station in Sector-72, ANI reported citing officials. Multiple areas of the city were impacted because of the electricity disruption, including Rapid Metro service.
Executive Engineer Anil Malik said, “This incident occurred around 7:50 pm. There was an oil leakage in the current transformer that is 220 KVA... The blast happened right when the breaker was being cut, and a fire broke out here... This led to a blackout situation," ANI reported.
He further noted that because of the fire, the power supply from the 220 KV sub-station to Sector-52 and 56, including 5 sub-stations, was disrupted. Suggesting that the fire broke out due to thermal heating, he added, "The Rapid Metro service was also suspended along with it, although we had restored it around 8:25 pm ... We have restored the entire system from our end so far... This incident was caused by thermal heating. The situation is completely under control."
According to PRO of Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN), Sandeep Chugh, the power supply disruption was caused by a technical fault. This triggered an oil leak and subsequent blast in the current transfer circuit.
The electricity department issued a statement announcing that power has been restored in sectors 15, 38, 44, 46, 52 and 56. "Power Supply Restored from the 220 KVA Power Station in Sector 72, Gurugram", ANI reported citing the statement. Rapid Metro services were restored by 8:15 pm, officials informed the news agency.
The official statement further confirmed that the “Blast Was Caused by Oil Leakage in the Current Transfer Circuit.” Officials indicated that “Power Supply to 7 Power Stations Disrupted Due to the Blast in the Current Transfer Circuit”. To carry out emergency repairs, electricity department personnel including Executive Engineer (XEN), were deployed on-site.
Elaborating why technical experts of Haryana Electricity Distribution Corporation were unable to trip the breaker after the fault first developed, XEN said an oil leak in the transfer circuit escalated before aby action could be taken which resulted in a transformer explosion and fire.
According to XEN, the blast ruptured of the collars of the Current Transformer (CT), which further triggered faults in adjacent systems, causing widespread disruption across two major 220 kV substations in Sector 56 and Sector 52 in addition to five linked 66 KV substations.
Due to the large-scale blackout, Rapid Metro services, which operate from the Sector 56 power station, also came to a halt at 7:50 pm. The Rapid Metro service faced disruption for nearly an hour.
"Due to power supply failure from Sec 72 substation of HVPNL in Gurugram, which feeds power to Rapid Metro, Gurugram, and the Gurugram section of the Yellow Line, train services were not available from 7:50 pm to 8:33 pm in Rapid Metro," a DMRC spokesperson said as quoted by PTI. However, services on the Yellow Line continued to run as normal as they were regulated through standby substation.
"By 10:10 pm, the department had fully restored the entire system on its end. Currently, there is no impact on the power supply," ANI quoted the officials as saying.
