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We know the past 24 hours have been tough for many households and businesses across WA following severe storms through Perth, the Mid West and Wheatbelt, and we appreciate the patience shown by our communities.
At the peak of the storm, around 115,000 customers were affected by outages caused by damaging winds and debris impacting powerlines and equipment.
Damaging winds brought down trees and debris onto powerlines, affecting around 23,000 customers in Geraldton and surrounds at the peak of the outages.
In the Mid West, the storm caused significant damage to both transmission and local distribution lines. Helicopter patrols have identified 20 damaged transmission poles and 30 damaged distribution poles. To support the community, we’ve deployed six emergency response generators to essential infrastructure, with additional generators being deployed today to Cervantes and Jurien.
There are around 9,000 customers currently without power in the Mid West and Wheatbelt regions predominantly due to the bushfires in Warradarge, Eneabba, Mogumber and Bindoon Impacted areas include parts of Moora, Green Head, Leeman, Three Springs, Northam, Dandaragan, Jurien Bay and Cervantes.
We’re communicating with impacted customers via SMS on updates including estimated restoration times and response efforts.
We're working closely with the Department of Fire and Emergency Services to safely access firegrounds where possible. At this stage, the bushfires have damaged network infrastructure including several transmission and distribution poles and wires which will require repair or replacement.
Crews are working as quickly and safely as possible to complete ground and aerial patrols, assess damage and undertake repairs. Due to the scale of the damage, and more adverse weather forecasted, we have dispatched crews from our South and Metro regions to support response efforts.
We’re continuing to work with Telstra, who have deployed generators to ensure essential telecommunications services are available for the community.
There are currently around 8,600 customers without power in the Mid West and Wheatbelt regions and surrounds as a result of yesterday’s storm damage and various Emergency Warning and Watch and Act level bushfires currently burning in the area. Impacted areas include parts of Three Springs, Moora, Northam, Jurian Bay and Cervantes.
We are communicating with customers directly impacted via SMS with information and updates including estimated restoration times and our response efforts.
Crews are on standby to access the firegrounds where it is safe to do so. Additionally, crews are continuing to conduct repairs following the significant storm damage that moved through the area yesterday.
With more adverse weather including lightning moving through the regions all available crews have been dispatched from other parts of the network to support restoration efforts.
We’ve worked with Telstra who deployed generators to ensure essential telecommunications services are available for the community.
Jurien Bay and surrounds
As a result of a bushfire in the Jurien Bay area, around 3,000 customers remain without power.
Initial inspections have indicated 30 damaged poles within the fireground that required repairs and or replacing.
A high voltage injection unit (HVIU) has been dispatched to support the Jurien Bay townsite and we anticipate this large scale generator will be in situ and connected by midday tomorrow. Where possible, our Network Control team will work to isolate and backfeed power supply to some customers ahead of time.
HVIUs connect several emergency response generators together, that are monitored and managed remotely, to power a larger area than would normally be possible when using a single generator.
Additionally, six Emergency Response Generators being deployed to support parts of Cervantes and surrounds. We are working with emergency and community services to target essential services.
There are currently around 6,600 customers without power in the Mid West Region and surrounds following yesterday’s storm event, lightning, and various bushfires in the region. Impacted areas include parts of Three Springs, Moora, Northam, Jurian Bay and Cervantes.
The outage that was impacting approximately 23,000 customers in Geraldton and surrounds was a result of significant storm damage on multiple transmission lines and distribution lines. Western Power crews worked to repair damaged infrastructure on the transmission lines and the majority of those customers, that aren’t impacting by separate bushfires, have been restored.
With more adverse weather forecast for this afternoon and into this evening crews in the area are ready to be dispatched in the event of any additional damage.
Your safety is our priority. If you see fallen powerlines or damage, stay at least eight metres away and Make The Safe Call to Western Power on 13 13 51.
We thank the community for your patience and support as we work to safely restore power as quickly as possible. For updates visit out outage page.
This morning outages across the Mid West were reduced to around 3,000 customers, mainly in the Jurien Bay area, with repairs continuing today.
Our crews have been working around the clock in difficult and hazardous conditions, and as of this morning, power has been restored to thousands of homes and businesses.
With a high number of hazards across the network, combined with fire bans in parts of the Mid West, some repairs are taking longer than we would like. These conditions mean restoration times may be delayed as our crews work carefully to keep the community, emergency responders and our teams safe.
Your safety is our priority. If you see fallen powerlines or damage, stay at least eight metres away and Make The Safe Call to Western Power on 13 13 51.
Power supply has been restored to over 102,000 homes and business, with 13,000 across the network remaining affected, mostly in the Midwest Region as a result of bushfires burning across the State.
Most customers in the metropolitan area have been restored today with some smaller pockets of customers still impacted. Current estimated restoration times for those remaining impacted customers range as crews continue to work as quickly and safely as possible to assess and repair damage. We thank the community for their patience.
Yesterday’s storm damage was significant and widespread across the WA main electricity network. The remaining outages in the metro area are in smaller pockets of suburbs including Rivervale, Lesmurdie and Kelmscott and we anticipate we will be able to restore most customers this evening.
The damaging and destructive winds associated with the storm front threw debris, including tree branches, into the network damaging equipment and bringing down powerlines.
The widespread impact meant crews have needed and are continuing to patrol a significant portion of the network to identify and respond to faults. We’ve worked closely with the BOM and stood up additional crews to respond to the damage.
We prioritise community infrastructure such as schools when repairing and restoring power. As crews are responding to the faults, all planned works were cancelled today.
We have mobilised additional resources to the impacted areas today to support the patrols, repair and restoration work.
Our priority is responding to reported hazards to ensure the safety of the community and our crews. Customers may notice a team attend their hazard to make it safe, but power is not restored. This is to ensure the safety of community, our crews and other agencies (like SES/DFES/LGs) who may also be mopping up in the area. There may also be other faults on the line which need to be made safe and repaired prior to restoration. In these instances we will restore power as soon as we can.
Power supply has been restored to over 100,000 homes and business, with 15,000 across the network remaining affected.
Current estimated restoration times for the Perth metro range as crews continue to assess and repair damage. We’re aiming to get the majority of customers back on today.
Once the power has been restored customers who experience an outage for longer than 12 consecutive hours are encouraged to apply for an extended outage payment - they are an acknowledgement of inconvenience payment rather than compensation.
If you see a fallen power line, stay at least eight metres away and Make The Safe Call to Western Power on 13 13 51.
We thank the community for your patience and support as we work to safely restore power as quickly as possible. For updates visit out outage page.
Our crews have been working around the clock to restore power safely. As of this morning, electricity has been restored to around 75,000 homes and businesses, with 38,000 customers still affected. There are approximately 100 outages still being assessed and repaired, and crews worked through the night with 79+ hazards active across the network.
With a high number of hazards still active across the network, and fire bans in place in parts of the affected areas, some restoration times may be delayed. Safety must come first, and our crews are working carefully in challenging conditions to restore power as quickly and safely as possible.
Here’s how we’re responding:
If you see a fallen power line, stay at least eight metres away and Make The Safe Call to Western Power on 13 13 51.
We thank the community for your patience and support as we work to safely restore power as quickly as possible. For updates visit out outage page.
Our role is to provide safe and reliable electricity to our customers. During the bushfire season, we make changes to the way we operate in high and extreme fire risk areas.
Our systems that remotely and automatically restore power are altered during the hotter months to reduce the chance of a spark causing a fire. Occasionally, the process of automatically restoring power can add to the risks of fire. In high and extreme fire areas it is safer to physically check lines before power is restored after an interruption to make sure there are no branches or foreign objects touching the powerlines.
Ground and/or helicopter patrols must visually inspect lines before power is restored, to ensure it is safe to do so. Aerial restrictions sometimes apply limiting our use of helicopter patrols.
Alternatively, we may remotely restore the power when the risk of fire is lower, for example during the night.
As a result of these factors, there may be a delay in restoring power.
If you happen to experience a power interruption in the hotter months, we ask for your patience.
To help us maintain safe and reliable power, we encourage you to report any fault to 13 13 51.
Estimated restoration times relating to postcodes are only ever estimates.
This is because in a ‘postcode area’ there are numerous powerlines that are not necessarily interconnected, which means that restoring power to a line may return power to some customers in one street, but not others.
Additionally, conditions on the ground can change which may impact how safely and quickly our crews can repair the network and restore power.
We recognise it is frustrating to read the message “Restoration time: unknown”. An unknown restoration time message can arise when there is extensive damage to the network, generally caused by a major incident such as a storm, and our crews are attending to many faults.
In such cases, our crews must firstly make each site safe before work can commence.
When there are many faults in a suburb, repair work on one fault may return power to some customers, but not others. Therefore it is not possible to give an estimated restoration time for a suburb that is meaningful for all affected customers within that suburb.
Ground and/or helicopter patrols are required to visually inspect lines before power is restored, to ensure it is safe to do so. In times of strong winds, aerial restrictions sometimes apply limiting our use of helicopter patrols.
You may be able to make a claim if loss or damage to your property was caused by Western Power equipment or actions.
Claims can be lodged online and should include supporting information such as photos, receipts or repair quotes. Each claim is assessed on a case-by-case basis.
Western Power does not compensate for loss or damage caused by circumstances outside our control, such as severe weather, storms, high winds, debris, vegetation, bushfires, lightning or wildlife. These events are not considered network faults.
If your claim is declined, we’ll explain why. This information can also be used to support a claim with your home or contents insurer.
To find out more or lodge a claim, visit the Make a claim section of our website.
Some medicines, such as insulin and other temperature-sensitive treatments, need to be kept cool to remain effective.
If your power is off:
For general health advice, you can also contact Healthdirect on 1800 022 222.
If you or someone in your household relies on medical or life support equipment that requires electricity, it’s important to plan ahead.
We recommend that you:
If a power outage creates a medical emergency, call 000 immediately.
If you're affected by power outages lasting 12 hours or more, you may be eligible for an Extended Outages Payment once power is reconnected.