By John Myers, Jr., Staff Reporter

IT WILL take the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) another 21 to 28 days to restore power to the majority of island as its restoration crews work round-the-clock to repair damage caused by Hurricane Ivan.

Robert Patrick, senior vice-president of generation and engineering, explained that the light and power company was "trying to restore a lot of customers, but we expect we will be (spending) another three to four weeks trying get customers back in service."

The senior vice-president of generation and engineering said while damage to JPS's light and power infrastructure was not extensive, there were severe blows to some key areas. However, "We have put back 50 of the 112 distribution circuits that we have serving our customers... We probably have 170,000 customers back in service." Currently "our demand is about 140 megawatts, which is just about 20 per cent of what our usual demand is." He noted, however, that some circuits were either damaged or were not surveyed, resulting in them not being turned on.

OVERSEAS ASSISTANCE SOURCED

To speed up the restoration process, Tom Dorsey, senior vice-president of customer operations, said additional crews will be sourced from overseas. "The preliminary results from our surveys indicate that we need to bring in some outside crews so we have under way right now a search to bring in no less than 10 line crews and associated equipment. We are also making a search to see if we can get a heavy lift helicopter to help us get lines up into the most difficult terrains," he said. Mr. Dorsey said the company was looking to bring in about 50 linesmen in total.

While the cost and extent of the damage has not yet been fully assessed, Charles Matthews, president of the JPS, said preliminary assessments indicated that it was less than the US$8 million it cost the company in 1988 to repair damage caused by Hurricane Gilbert.

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