Squall uproots 50 power poles in Ludhiana

Saturday night’s squall led to falling of nearly 50 electricity poles on a road near Kanganwal village, causing losses worth crores to the city’s power infrastructure and plunging the village into darkness.

Area residents say power was supplied for a few hours only as repair work was going on and it might continue for three-four days. In addition to this, commuting in the area has become difficult as the road was covered by cables and fallen electricity poles. Some trees in the vicinity of the village fell on the power cables due to the high velocity winds, ultimately leading to the falling of the poles.

Kokila, an area resident, said that a major tragedy had been averted as his son entered the house only a few minutes before one of the electricity poles fell near their house. “Had he been out, it would have been devastating,” said she.

Another area resident, Ashok said that one of the poles fell on a car that was parked outside the house. Thankfully, there was no human loss, but it led to huge losses, both to the PSPCL and people living in the area.

Dinesh Kumar, who runs a shop in the area, said that he was shocked to see the condition of the road in the morning. “I could only see electricity poles and cables spread across the entire road. I had to walk with great care on the road,” he said.

Chief Engineer, PSPCL, Narinderpal Singh Boparai said that the strong winds uprooted poplar trees in the area, snapped branches and brought down electricity poles, leading to outages in the area.

“We have started the repair work and as of now power is being supplied to the area for few hours only. It will take two-three days to fully repair the damage. The losses are in crores, the assessment of which will be done tomorrow and only then the exact amount will be known,” Boparai added.