Major incident declared in Shetland as power cuts expected to last days

dailyrecord.co.uk:

The Scottish Government has declared a major incident in Shetland as thousands of homes face days without power in freezing temperatures.

Residents reported a blackout on Monday afternoon and despite efforts from SSEN engineers, power is expected to be off until Thursday.The Scottish Government Resilience Room met today to discuss the impacts of the power outages and subsequently declared a major incident as more engineers are expected to arrive in Shetland on Wednesday morning.Police Scotland has also warned residents to stay indoors to avoid treacherous weather conditions as Shetland's Area Commander urged people to try and find ways to stay warm.So far power has been restored to more than 2,500 properties, with 3,800 currently off supply in Voe, Whalsay, Brae, Tumblin, Yell and Unst.Justice Secretary Keith Brown, lead Minister for resilience said: “The challenging circumstances facing parts of Shetland have been declared a major incident and, while SSEN is making every effort to restore supplies, it is clear that many properties will face days without power.“This afternoon I chaired a meeting of the Scottish Government Resilience Room (SGoRR) with our multi-agency partners to make every effort to restore power and support households.“Sumburgh airport has now reopened and we are working with SSEN and transport operators to maximise capacity.

We expect more SSEN engineers will arrive early tomorrow morning and will continue to do what we can to get as many staff and as much equipment to Shetland as needed, as early as possible."He added: “Our utmost priority must be to ensure that people, especially the most vulnerable, are safe and warm.