Eastbourne and Seaford power cuts: Network damage 'more significant than first thought'

East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service said it was called to a fire in Eastbourne around 7.15am. Firefighters from Eastbourne and Seaford responded to ‘reports of an electricity box on fire’, which was ‘causing an electricity outage’.

UK Power Networks said an underground electricity cable faulted on its high voltage network, ‘causing an area wide power cut’. They said staff were working to restore power ‘as quickly and as safely as possible’.

Meanwhile, an outage in Seaford has been put down a faulty piece of equipment which ‘controls the power to your home’.

Power was expected to be restored by 4.30pm but experts now believe some properties will be without electricity until 7.30pm.Temporary generators were brought in, while engineers continued with repairs.

A UK Power Networks spokesperson: “We became aware of the fault at 6.47am. The cause is a fault with an underground cable in the BN20 and BN21 area, our engineers were dispatched to site at 6.52 and they arrived in the area at 7.24.

“Our engineers have just called in to advise us that the damage to our network is more significant than first thought and further sets of generators will be needed to safely restore properties.

“Unfortunately, it's going to take us past our current time frame to complete this safely, so we're now working towards between 18.30 and 19.30 to have power back on.

"We can appreciate how frustrating and disruptive being without power can be, and our staff are working as fast as they can.”

As of 1.30pm, engineers have been able to divert more electricity around the faulty part of the network, ‘restoring power to further properties’.

The postcodes affected by the outages are: BN20 7; BN21 1; BN21 4; BN20 9; BN21 3; BN24 7; CRO 5; SW16 5.

This means homes and businesses are without power in; Meads; Eastbourne Pier; Eastbourne College; Willingdon, Wannock and Ratton. More than 1,000 customers are thought to be impacted by these outages.

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