17 February 2023
Members of the public will be aware that on Friday 20 January 2023, SHG enacted its emergency planning protocols and convened an Incident Command and Control Group.
This was in response to the report the previous day that a major fault had been experienced at the Power Station. The fault meant that Generator No.1 was out of service and no longer operational, resulting in only two generators being available to provide power to the Island. This resulted in a significant risk that should any further faults be experienced there would not be sufficient power generation capacity to meet the Island demand.
Following the arrival of a replacement part, it was confirmed on Tuesday 07 February that Generator No.1 had been repaired and was therefore operational again.
The power generation system continues to be monitored and Connect remain confident that the original issue has now been successfully addressed.
Given there is no longer an immediate risk to the energy supply across the Island, in line with SHG’s emergency planning procedures the Incident Command and Control Group has been stood down by the Gold Commander, the Chief Secretary, Susan O’Bey.
A review and evaluation session will be held for all those involved to assess what went well and what could have been done differently. This will ensure that the valuable lessons learned are taken into account, putting the Island in a stronger position should we find ourselves in a similar extraordinary situation in the future.
Thanks are again extended to the team at the Power Station for their hard work in ensuring minimal disruption to the power supply during the last four weeks, and for returning the Power Station to standard operations.
Any queries on this matter can be directed to Connect by phone on 22255 or by email through enquiries@connect.co.sh.
Note to Editor:
Incident Command and Control Groups are brought together during a major incident or a situation that could lead to a major incident to ensure that key stakeholders are suitably prepared to respond quickly and effectively. In line with SHG’s Major Incident Response Plan the group was led by the Chief Secretary, Susan O’Bey, and was formed of key officials from Connect St Helena Ltd, the emergency services and SHG.
During a major incident or a situation that could lead to a major incident the model for Command, Control and Coordination will broadly follow the UK principles of command and control (i.e. Gold (Strategic), Silver (Tactical) and Bronze (Operational)).
These groups assess the risks and mitigate them as far as possible during an incident, with the key aims of, working together, saving lives and reducing harm, before restoring the community to a state of normality as soon as possible.
More information about how this works in practice is contained in the SHG Major Incident Response Plan, which has been developed on the principles of Integrated Emergency Management, those being: Anticipation, Assessment, Prevention, Preparation, Response and Recovery. The plan can be viewed on the SHG website via www.sainthelena.gov.sh/portfolios/safety-security-and-home-affairs/emergency-planning/.
SHG
17 February 2023