M1 bridge, no danger to motorists!

CITY POWER assured motorists on Thursday, 2 May, that there is no imminent danger on the M1 Highway bridge in Joburg.

This comes after the M1 Highway was engulfed with fire on Wednesday morning, 1 May.

Speaking to Daily Sun, standing on the bridge where the fire was raging, City Power spokesman Isaac Mangena said, “We are here to assess whether our technicians can access the tunnels so that we can see how much damage was caused and how much work is needed to be put in to ensure that we replace the damaged infrastructure.”

It’s suspected that the fire may have resulted from theft and vandalism of the electricity infrastructure. However, the structure is still intact.

Some of the damage on the bridge. Photo by Nhlanhla Khomola

“Preliminary findings indicate that a cable connecting the Braamfontein Substation to the Fordsburg substation caught fire during the suspected cable theft and vandalism. The recyclers on Carr Street are suspected to have gained access to the bridge, and they went up since the fire came from there,” he said.

City Power managed to retrieve the already cut copper cables that were ready to be taken to the scrapyard by the recyclers who have erected shacks on Carr Street.

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Mangena said that structurally, the structure doesn’t look intact, so the integrity of the structure is questionable, and as such, they will be calling structural engineers to assist in checking if it is safe.

“Until the EMS has given us the clearance that the area is safe for us to work in, then we won’t be able to work.

“Our teams are going around looking at the network to see if there are any areas that we can turn into so that there can be electricity in some areas,” he said.

He added that the restoration of the area will not happen anytime soon; however, they will communicate with customers.

Parts of the M1 bridge has been closed. Photo by Nhlanhla Khomola

“We are not sure how long the process will take, the extend of the damage is huge, we need new infrastructure but before installing we need to check the tunnels,’’ he said.

Meanwhile, the local power utility is exploring alternatives to supply power to the affected customers by back-feeding through the Fort and Bree Substations.

Progress on work conducted on-site will be communicated throughout the day. Operations on site follow the fire that occurred in the underground tunnels along the M1 near Smit Street and the double-decker section.