Vector media update 13 Feb 3.30pm
 
Vector crews have been working through the day to restore power to homes and businesses affected by Cyclone Gabrielle. The numbers continue to go up and down and, as of 3.30pm, were standing at nearly 13,000 customers without power. Thousands have been restored since our previous update, while new ones have cropped up, and some are taking much longer to reach and fix.
 
Around a thousand field crews and support staff are helping with Vector’s power restoration effort. In some cases there are multiple faults occurring and, as we restore power, another fault happens in the same area. While this is the nature of these sorts of extreme weather events, we know it is hugely frustrating for customers.
 
But rest assured, our crews are committed to getting customers’ power back on and are doing everything they safely can to fix the existing and new faults. As previously advised, there are conditions when our crews will have to stop work due to unsafe working conditions.
 
There are ways you can help too, so that we can direct our efforts in the most effective way possible. If you have logged an outage, and it is showing up on our outage centre, please do not call to log it again. We will assign a crew and get to you as soon as possible. We know how stressful it can be, especially if your power is out for extended periods of time, but multiple calls or online entries about the same address can slow down our ability to respond.
 
Thanks again to Aucklanders for their patience and understanding. There’s information about the restoration process and what to expect on our website: Storm damage: what to expect if you lose your power
 
To report an outage or check an address for an outage go to: Vector.co.nz/outages

The next media update will be at 6.30pm today.