CLEOPATRA MURPHY

FN News Reporter

cleopatra@nasguard.com

President and CEO of the Grand Bahama Power Company (GBPC) Sarah McDonald is urging customers to stay away from potentially dangerous downed power lines.

"Prior to the storm we do warn our customers about making sure they stay away from downed power lines because you never know if they are energized or not and that continues, especially as much of the island is back on, you never know what could be down," she said.

McDonald noted there was an injury in Nassau and a fatality in Jamaica, so it is a very serious matter.

The power company and the Grand Bahama Utility Company provided status updates on their services during a press conference at the Office of the Prime Minister yesterday.

"We often try to explain to people our processes and why it sometimes takes so long to get power in some areas. It is because this is a dangerous commodity we are dealing with," she said.

McDonald said less than one percent of its customers are still without power, adding that those are mainly areas that suffered extensive flooding.

"Shortly after 7 p.m. (Tuesday) night we were able to restore power to customers in the eastern end of the island all the way to McLean's Town.

Customers in Deep Water Cay and Sweeting's Cay have suffered extensive damage and we couldn't even begin addressing those until the flooding had subsided, so we've had our damage crews out since 6 o'clock (Wednesday) morning and we'll get the work packages and be able to send our crews out as soon as possible," she said.

McDonald said Queens Cove, the most heavily impacted, will probably be out for a few more days as the company tries to rebuild the backbone to get individual customers back up.

Geron Turnquest, manager at the Grand Bahama Utility Company, said water services have been fully restored and water is pumping to all areas of the island.

He added that it is also up to drinking standards.

"The plant out over the bridge that was heavily impacted with flooding we are still pumping with the extent by diesel because the electricals also got some water intrusion into the plant, so we have to make sure check the electrical out before we actually turn power onto them, but it's not going to affect our capability of supplying water to the city," he said.