January 30, 2016
Thousands of South Burnett residents were without power for nearly three and a half hours on Friday afternoon after a string of storms passed across the region.
Heavy rainfall was recorded in many towns and hail fell in Nanango.
According to the Bureau of Meteorology, a total of 23.2mm fell in Kingaroy on Friday, followed by another 41.8mm to 3:00pm on Saturday.
An Ergon Energy spokesman said two sub-transmission lines between the Tarong and Kingaroy sub-stations both tripped during Friday’s storm, which was unusual.
“This resulted in about 14,000 customers in Kingaroy, Nanango, Yarraman, Blackbutt, Kumbia and surrounding areas having their power supply interrupted from 2:40pm until just before 6:00pm,” the spokesman said.
Smaller numbers of Ergon Energy customers in other parts of the South Burnett also were affected by blackouts, while some areas that were part of the larger outage experienced longer interruptions due to faults on their section of the network.
Customers at Kingaroy Shoppingworld were herded out of stores as the power was cut, and shop owners pulled down shutters.
A total of 20,838 lightning strokes were recorded in the South Burnett Regional Council area during the storm.
