Communications problems exacerbated London power cut chaos

London Underground [LU] and London’s electricity providers must improve how they communicate with key public services during a major crisis to prevent a repeat of the disruption seen during last summer's major power outage.

In a London Assembly report published yesterday the Tube, National Grid and EDF Energy are urged to review the way that they impart information to emergency and other public services in the event of serious power loss across the capital. LU in particular must review how it communicates with each Tube line, how calls are prioritised and handled and how vital information is disseminated.

Poor communication exacerbated the capital’s power failure chaos on 28th August 2003. The report by the Public Services Committee reveals that it took 30 minutes for electricity providers to inform police that terrorism was not involved and failed to tell the Mayor and other public service providers for up to two hours. The committee said that this length of delay is unacceptable in the aftermath of 9/11.

Andrew Pelling AM, chair of the committee said: “I trust that the power companies will listen and hear our recommendations on the importance of information flow in such emergencies. Next time timeliness of information flow could be a matter of life or death. In a multiple major terrorist emergency, there would be a danger that people would be unknowingly shepherded towards rather than away from danger because of poor information flow.”

The full report can be viewed here.

•Date: 10th February 2004 •Region: UK •Type: Article •Topic: Crisis communications
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