Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) has now restored all reported customer faults following Storms Malik and Corrie.
SSEN would like to thank customers for their patience as our teams worked to safely reconnect over 120,000 homes in the north of Scotland affected by Storms Malik and Corrie, which brought gusts of over 90mph to the region.
Across both storms, SSEN’s network experienced in excess of 450 high voltage network faults caused by fallen trees and wind-borne debris striking overhead power lines. The intensity of the wind gusts, stronger than Storm Arwen in some locations, caused multiple damages to SSEN’s infrastructure, requiring complex repairs.
Storm Malik caused significant damage to our network in North East Scotland, particularly Ballater, Braemar, Tarland, Kintore and Banchory in Aberdeenshire. Although more widespread in impact across the north, areas such as Stonehaven and Edzell faced the worst of Storm Corrie, with record wind speeds recorded.
We will continue to deploy an enhanced workforce in the North East of Scotland ready to carry out any necessary further repairs and maintenance of mobile generators as required. SSEN teams will be on hand to support our customers if needed at this stage.
SSEN has received a large number of notifications from customers with over 46,000 calls to our Customer Contact Centre, and over 13,000 messages received on our social media channels. Now that all known faults have been restored, to ensure that we have visibility of all power interruptions and network damage at a local level, any customer without power who has not contacted SSEN by phone or Power Track to report the power cut, should contact SSEN on 105.
SSEN continues to urge customers not to approach any damage to its infrastructure and instead, report it to SSEN by calling 105 or via its Power Track App and engineers will investigate as soon as possible.
Richard Gough, Director of Distribution System Operations at SSEN, said:
“I would like to thank our communities for their continued patience as our teams have worked hard to restore power in challenging circumstances. Coming just weeks after the extensive damage caused by Storm Arwen, the dual impact of Storms Malik and Corrie posed a significant and unique challenge, with often complex repairs being undertaken while battling conditions and balancing priorities.
“I’d also like to recognise the remarkable efforts of teams from SSEN, other electricity network companies and contract partners across the UK and Ireland, whose hard work in very challenging conditions has helped us to restore power safely to communities across the North of Scotland and ensured our customers were supported. Equally, the close co-operation with local resilience partners, who did a fantastic job in supporting customers and communities on the ground, has been great to see.
“Our concentration and alert status remain the same for the time being as we focus on repairing the network damage needed for system resilience, but not affecting customer supplies. SSEN teams will carry out remedial repairs and identify any further damage on our localised network. We have contacted all customers involved in the power restoration activities today and we are asking any customers who are returning to an unoccupied property or who have not been in contact with us and are still without power, to contact 105 as soon as possible.”
Additional information
SSEN is urging people to not approach any damage to its equipment and instead, report it to SSEN by calling 105 or via its Power Track App and engineers will investigate as soon as possible.
Teams from SSEN’s Customer Contact Centre continue to proactively contact customers on its Priority Services Register (PSR) to keep them updated and to offer extra support where possible, with over 54,000 proactive contacts to warn customers in advance of the storm.
SSEN’s Priority Services Register (PSR) provides extra help and support during a power cut. Customers are eligible for SSEN's free priority services if they:
- Are deaf or hard of hearing
- Have a disability
- Live with children under five
- Are blind or partially sighted
- Have a chronic illness
- Use medical equipment/aids reliant on electricity
- Are over 60
- Temporarily need extra support
To find out more about the PSR, click here or call 0800 294 3259.
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