Jersey gas: 'Software error' caused island-wide shutdown - BBC.com

Jersey gas: 'Software error' caused island-wide shutdown - BBC News

Jersey gas: 'Software error' caused island-wide shutdown

- Published

Gas will not be restored in Jersey until Tuesday at the earliest after a software failure triggered an island-wide shutdown.

Island Energy said the issue at its La Collette plant had been fixed, but gas had to be reintroduced in stages.

It said this would begin from Tuesday and was likely to take "several days" to complete.

The firm is going door to door in Jersey to ensure gas is switched off at the mains before it is restored.

Additional staff are being brought in from the UK to assist, the company said, with vulnerable and commercial customers prioritised.

Government building checks

Gas was switched off for thousands of customers in Jersey on Saturday.

Island Energy initially said its plant experienced a power failure, but the firm has since said the shutdown was caused by a software failure.

Islanders have reported significant disruption as a result of the outage, with restaurants unable to cook hot food and no running hot water in many homes.

The Government of Jersey said there was there was "minor but manageable" disruption to one of the wards at Overdale Hospital.

But it said it was still "assessing the impact" of the disruption on other government properties.

Island Energy said it had "isolated and fixed" the problem at the Jersey plant.

"A software error triggered the safety procedure which shut down the plant, which it will do if there is any risk to the network, ensuring that we are safe," it said.

"This issue has now been fixed and we are working on the restoration plan to get the gas network back up."

The company said gas needed to be restored in a "controlled and safe manner".

"This means that from Tuesday we will start to bring customers back on to supply, a process that will likely take several days to fully complete."

Follow BBC Jersey on channel.islands@bbc.co.uk.