Around 1,000 homes and businesses in the Ballyclare Road area of Glengormley were left without electricity recently following contractor damage to a high voltage underground cable.

Northern Ireland Electricity is warning all contractors working in the vicinity of underground electricity cables to follow strict safety guidelines.

The incident happened as a contractor installing a new gas service with a mole drill hit and damaged an electricity cable supplying the local area. NIE emergency crews, responded immediately, arriving on site to assess the damage and restoring supplies to all customers within two hours.

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Repairs to the damaged cable continued through the day with final repairs and safety checks completed later that evening.

Valerie Curran, NIE Customer Relations Manager for the Glengormley area, once again urged contractors working in the vicinity of underground cables to follow safety precautions prior to work commencing.

She said: "Luckily in this incident no-one was injured but the results could have been very different. Contractors should exercise extreme caution when working in the vicinity of underground cables, using safe working practices such as digging trial holes and digging by hand to avoid any damage to or alteration of the location of the cable. Any incident of damage to the electricity network can cause inconvenience to customers in surrounding areas and place contractors at risk from injury."

(CD/JP)