LINES Company crews worked long hours to restore power following Cyclone Gabrielle. PHOTO SUPPLIED
MIKE Fox, chief executive of The Lines Company, said damage following the cyclone was substantial, with least 3700 customers without power at one point.
Several days later, with repair work in full swing, this had fallen to about 400 and after that it seemed to halve about every day. Not bad for a lines company whose territory includes 12% of the area of the North Island, but just 1% of its population.
“We had significant damage to our network due to forestry damage. The scale (of fallen trees) was astonishing, but we restored power as safely and as quickly as we could.”
Mike described Cyclone Gabrielle as, “a once in the generation event”.
“Over the first three days about 1200 calls came in and we logged about 500 individual faults. A typical day for us is about seven faults – so that’s 10 weeks-worth of faults in three days.”
This generated a massive response, right across the company, which the public was largely unaware of.
“A lot of support is provided behind the scenes to ensure our people are kept safe; that we know where they are and that they are targeting the right sort of areas to get as many customers back on as quickly as possible.”
Mike said everyone played a part, from front-line repair crews to teams managing incidents back at base, even caterers who fed those manning the phone lines. To meet the extraordinary demand from people who had lost power, the segment of staff who normally fielded phone inquiries were backfilled with workers from the likes of finance and HR.
“Yes, it really was a massive team effort and because of the pressure we must look after health, safety and well-being holistically, whether that’s the front-line staff, the incident management team or any of our people.
“Following initial outages, we generally work through on those first couple of days till about 10pm, with much of that focussed on public safety. Making sure people don’t get tangled up in downed lines plus restoring what we can. With long days needed we actively manage fatigue. While making the most of the daylight hours we see to it everyone gets the opportunity to get a good night’s rest.”
“Something that resonates with our people is that they know that they serve their community. Whether it is the one they live in or not; it’s always a strong motivation (to restore power).”
This imperative and sense of responsibility seems stronger than at any other place Mike has worked.
He said as a region, the Central North Island have come off pretty lightly compared to Northland or the East Coast.
“And our whole customer base has been really supportive and understanding. We really appreciated the support that people showed us on social media, and those who came up to have a chat with the crews to express their support.
“Personally, I just want to thank people for their patience as we worked through all this.”
