Black Friday marked by widespread WAPA blackouts

Black Friday is traditionally a day for big discounts on consumer goods, but this Friday was also marked by power blackouts for V.I. Water and Power Authority customers in the St. Thomas-St. John district.

The power failures started on some feeders Friday afternoon before the entire Randolph Harley Power Plant failed, leaving more than 26,000 customers without electricity. WAPA acknowledged the blackouts in a public alert at 8:12 p.m. Friday, and some feeders were restored at around 11:30 p.m. when generating Unit 15 was brought back online. Power was finally restored to all customers just before 1 a.m., according to WAPA.

The power failures continued Saturday afternoon, and WAPA said in a public alert at 5 p.m. that power had been cut off to Feeder 9C: “This outage is necessary to manage load capacity at the Randolph Harley Power Plant and to prevent a widespread outage across the island. At this time, there is no estimated time for restoration. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and appreciate your understanding and support. Thank you.”