BAGUIO CITY – The lines of BENECO hurdled Pepito’s gale-force wind and torrential rains, giving the cooperative a sigh of relief as no major damages were incurred.
The linemen have been deployed full force today as they were forced to stay put Sunday night when Pepito dumped its strongest rains, making restoration efforts dangerous.
“As of 8 this morning, majority of troubles that BENECO linemen were sent to fix are those reports of no lights and other concerns, Ramel Rifani, Network Services Department (NSD) manager, said.
This includes fixing a damaged pole somewhere in Atok, he said.
A heavy maintenance team composed of 10 linemen left very early for Cattubo, Atok, Benguet to replace the pole.
“Bumanesbes angin. Agsal-sala diay poste ken wires, narigat nga tiliwen ken makita” (the posts and power cables were dancing/swaying, it was difficult to grasp and see what we were supposed to work on),” was the common description of the linemen of the situation that night when typhoon Pepito’s surge was felt.
As of Monday, November 18, about 82.7% of the electricity at the household level and 72.4% at the barangay level for Baguio City and Benguet has been restored.
The recorded damages as of 8 AM Monday was P55,441.97.
The damages came mostly from damaged primary cables in Baguio City and the damaged pole in Atok, Benguet.
However, this figure may rise as additional damage reports continue to come in.
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