Western Power working to restore electricity to about 450 homes after storm dumps rain on Perth

More than 400 homes are still without power on Friday morning after a severe thunderstorm hit Perth yesterday.

On Thursday afternoon a peak of 11,400 homes across Midland, Swan View, Gooseberry Hill, Kalamunda and Maida Vale had gone dark after damaging winds damaged power lines.

And more than 12 hours later, a spokesperson for Western Power said crews were working to restore electricity to 450 homes and business.

“Last night Western Power emergency response crews restored power to the majority of customers impacted by yesterday afternoon’s severe thunderstorm activity that damaged network infrastructure,” they said.

“There are currently around 450 homes and businesses without power in the metropolitan area including Gooseberry Hill and Bellevue.

“These numbers may fluctuate as further hazards are reported through the day.”

Western Power estimates the recovery time to be sometime “this morning,” based on similar past events.

“Crews have responded to more than 40 hazards and our network operations team worked to isolate damaged parts of the network and backfeed where possible to restore power where it was safe to do so.”

A storm advice alert, issued by the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, remained across the metropolitan area on Friday morning.

“Be careful of fallen trees, damaged buildings and debris,” DFES said.

“Stay away from fallen powerlines, they are dangerous and should always be treated as live.”

State Emergency Service volunteers were responding to more than 75 assistance requests for damaged buildings, carports and water ingress.

It comes after a the wider Western Power network was severely impacted by light drizzly rain last week. The resultant 63 pole-top fires caused by the rain cut power to 40,000 homes.