Power outage briefly leaves 5,000 Hong Kong households in darkness

A power outage briefly left Hong Kong’s Kowloon City, a densely populated neighbourhood, in darkness on Thursday, with traffic lights malfunctioning, people trapped in lifts and about 5,000 households affected.\nPolice said they received a report at 4.18pm that people were trapped in a lift at Kowloon City Plaza and the shopping centre was in total darkness. The case was later classified as “assistance not required”.\nAt 5.04pm, another report was filed with the force concerning malfunctioning traffic lights at the junction of Dumbarton Road and Junction Road. Upon inspection, officers found the signals to be in good working condition.\n\nHong Kong’s biggest electricity provider, CLP Power, which serves customer accounts in Kowloon, the New Territories and the outlying islands, confirmed a fault occurred in the 11-kilovolt power supply system in the Kowloon City area, affecting about 5,000 customers.\n“Approximately 4,000 customers had their power restored within four minutes, while the remaining affected customers had their power back around 5pm,” a spokesman said, adding that an investigation was under way.\n“During the process, CLP restored power remotely and promptly dispatched personnel for inspection and repairs. CLP’s customer managers and community support teams maintained close communication with customers, providing necessary assistance.”\nDuring the power outage, a social media user shared a video capturing the moment a lift at Baptist University’s Ho Sin Hang Campus in Kowloon Tong was plunged into total darkness.\nSubsequent footage also shows a fire truck arriving at the campus to provide assistance.\nThe HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity in Kowloon Tsai also posted pictures showing campus activities carried on despite the outage, with teachers still holding classes and students navigating the library using mobile phone torches.\n