WAIPAHU, Hawaii (KHON2) — Preventing power outages by disabling enhanced safety features is what Hawaiian Electric is doing in several Oahu neighborhoods to prevent underground power lines from failing and knocking out electricity.
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Hawaiian Electric said recent safety improvements to reduce the risk of wildfires have left some underground lines in Waipio and Waipahu a little sensitive.
“And it essentially makes those circuits more sensitive to these types of interruptions and causes outages whenever they detect something that could result in a problem,” said Hawaiian Electric spokesman Darren Pai.
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Pai said the decades-old lines were affected after recent heavy rains.
“Water can leak,” Pai said. “That results in these failures that caused the outages.”
Residents have reported up to eight outages to us in the last month in Waipio and it’s just an inconvenience for most.
“But as for older people, yes. For people who rely on medical supplies, I think that would be a problem. That’s definitely concerning,” said part-time Waipio resident Markus Mullins.
Hawaiian Electric officials said they are working on long-term improvements to the underground lines, but are simply shutting down the enhanced wildfire safety features in Waipio and Waipahu.
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“Because the area is largely underground, the risk of ignition from an aerial source is mitigated to some extent,” Pai said. “Therefore, we are disabling these wildfire safety settings in the meantime to reduce the frequency of these outages.”
Some residents said that’s a bit concerning.
“Just because it’s not a fire-prone area doesn’t mean the fire risk shouldn’t be taken seriously,” Mullins said.
KHON2 asked if there is a timeline to turn off features in Waipio and Waipahu.
“We’re going to start doing it in Waipio-Waipahu right away. This happened in Mililani a couple of months ago and we took similar measures there as well,” Pai said.
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Authorities add that these failures occur mainly in older underground lines; the newer ones are covered in concrete. Hawaiian Electric is also reviewing other neighborhoods to determine if enhanced wildfire safety features should be closed elsewhere.
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