Quashing the rumours

BC Hydro is doing its best to knock down the rumour of a pending power interruption to the region due to the flooding.

The rumour has been floating around the Northwest for the last day or so as the water along the Bulkley and Skeena rivers continued to rise.

Bob Gammer of BC Hydro has been busy all day trying to reassure people in the flood stricken region that the Hydro system is fine and will continue to function, except in those localized instances where power to a specific residence needs to be terminated due to safety reasons.

CFTK had the story posted to their website, but they must be a little rattled there at the ole TV station, as the story posted to their site says that people “should be worried”, we believe judging by the tones of Mr. Gammer that the story should say “should not be worried”

From CFTK
Wednesday June 6, 2007

Rivers may be high.. and the highway blocked in spots.. but B-C Hydro says people should be worried about the lights going out.

Spokesperson Bob Gammer says the utility is trying to reassure residents in flood-struck communities such as Smithers and Terrace, that the Hydro system is secure.

"we have done overflights this week of transmission lines just to make sure we've kept an eye on them," says Gammer, "and they are secure at this point."

Gammer adds Hydro is not planning any outages.

He says safety-related emergency disconnections would affect only individual residences where the combination of electricity and water poses a danger.

Over at BC Hydro there are no major news releases provided outlining any current problems with the power supply and the localized trouble report only offers up the usual power outages, save for the Old Remo and Brauns Island disconnects in Terrace which are due to the flooding there.

Update: BC Hydro issued their own press release on Wednesday to reassure residents of the Northewest as to the stability of the electrical grid in the area.