M A I N   N E W S

Fire at Moga power grid
Manish Sirhindi
Tribune News Service

Moga, April 14
A major fire that broke out at the power grid here late last night resulted in huge losses to the Power Grid Corporation of India, besides disrupting the power supply to several parts of Malwa region.

The grid is located on the Moga-Kotkapura highway near Singhawala village. The authorities reported a major fire at around 8:30 last evening. Fire tenders from Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Bathinda and Moga were rushed to the gird and it took them more than 20 hours to bring down the flames.

Senior officials maintained that though the exact losses could not be assessed, initial estimates revealed it could be around Rs 15 crore. The transformer itself was worth Rs 10 crore, the officials said.

There are three transformers of 250 MW capacity each installed at the gird, out of which city II transformer caught fire due to sparking in its bushes. It set on fire about 65,000 liters of transformer oil, which became a major challenge for the fire tenders. The officials stated that the bushes sparked due to overheating.

A team of technical experts from Bathinda thermal plant was also called. Firemen at the site said the operation took longer then expected as there was no arrangement of water on the gird premises. They stated that the fire engines had to run to city to collect water.

It was around 7:30 am that the firefighters managed to control the flames but minor fires continued to break in the transformer till 2 pm. Though the fire was doused by then, the gird authorities retained two fire engines as a precautionary measure.

Sources in the PSEB maintained that the board had sought installation of another transformer at this grid to cater to increased power demand during the paddy season. However, the gird officials stated that the project had to be postponed now due to the fire incident.

Tough times ahead

Though the PSEB managed to restore power supply to the effected parts of Malwa region, officials maintained that the real problem would arise during the paddy season.

The damaged transformer would take at least three months before it is re-commissioned. They stated that the three transformers at the grid were not enough to meet the demand of the region during the paddy season and with one down the problem could further aggravate. This would mean that farmers of the region would have to face tough times ahead during the initial days of the paddy season, with inadequate power supply, which could affect the paddy yield.