By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
State owned power utility Eskom has published the latest load shedding schedules from Thursday (20 October) through to Sunday (23 October) following the breakdown of additional units overnight.
The group was forced to keep load shedding at stage 3 on Thursday morning but now plans to only extend it through to 05h00 on Friday. Thereafter, load shedding will continue intermittently at stage 3 and stage 2 through to Sunday.
The updated schedule is as follows:
Thursday, 20 October
- Stage 3: 05h00 – 00h00
Friday, 21 October
- Stage 3: 00h00 – 05h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 – 00h00
Saturday, 22 October
- Stage 3: 00h00 – 05h00
- Stage 2: 05h00 – 00h00
Sunday, 23 October
- Stage 2: All day to 00h00
Eskom said it will publish a further update on Sunday, or as soon as any further significant changes occur.
“Breakdowns of five generating units overnight, two of which have returned to service, have exacerbated current generation capacity shortages, forcing the escalation of load shedding. Since this morning a generation unit each at Arnot and Kriel power stations have been returned to service,” it said.
Two generation units at Kendal and one at Kusile power stations were taken offline for repairs.
The group currently has 5,146MW on planned maintenance, while another 16,434MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns.
South Africans are entering their 143rd day of load shedding in 2022, making it the worst year on record. Its ageing fleet is unreliable, and units are breaking down and being taken offline with alarming regularity.
For access to other load shedding schedules, Eskom has made them available on loadshedding.eskom.co.za.
Smartphone users can also download the app EskomSePush to receive push notifications when load shedding is implemented, as well as the times the area you are in will be off.