Electricity tampering causes a 2nd death

GEORGE NEWS - A man died on Thursday 25 April after being electrocuted in Zone 8, Thembalethu whilst illegally tampering with municipal electrical infrastructure. The man, approximately 30 years old, was electrocuted at around 14:15 and died in hospital later the same evening.

This is the second case of electrocution due to illegal tampering in the past 12 months. In August 2018, a man was killed while trying to run a wire across a ravine from New Dawn Park, Pacaltsdorp to the informal settlement All Bricks in Thembalethu.

In the recent incident, it appears that the deceased attempted to operate and tamper with the high voltage fuse links protecting the transformer. He seemed to have used two wattle poles tied together with wire to operate the fuse links - an extremely dangerous act which led to his death.

This particular area in Thembalethu is hamstrung by illegal connections, making electricity supply to legal consumers unreliable.

Attempts by the municipality to clamp down on the illegal connections have been relatively unsuccessful. The municipality strongly condemns such illegal connections as they not only pose a risk to the life of the person attempting the connection, but also are of extreme danger to any child, adult or animal in the area.

Illegal tampering with electricity claimed a second victim in eight months.

Illegal electricity connections draw more electricity from the network than anticipated, causing power failures and inconvenience to law-abiding paying customers. Communities must be alert to the basics of safe electricity usage and the risks associated with electricity theft, meter tampering, bypassing and illegal connections.

A full investigation will be carried out in regard to this incident.