Storm Henk kills power for hundreds of West Berkshire residents, leaving many homes without heating

Many residents have been without power for more than 28 hours.

The New Year did not start well for hundreds of West Berkshire residents who were left without power since Tuesday.

The power outage – which affected several properties in the RG8 8QN postcode – was caused by high winds damaging overhead lines, claims Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN).

An SSEN spokesperson said: “SSEN was alerted to a fault in Pangbourne on Tuesday, January 2, which was affecting power supplies to 311 local customers.

“Engineers attended the site to repair wires from the overhead network, which had been brought down by the high winds during Storm Henk.

“By switching customers to unaffected parts of the circuit, engineers were able to restore supplies to all but 16 customers, whose power was restored at 1.04am today (Thursday).”

An Ashampstead Common resident had her power restored in the early hours of today.

But she says she is unhappy with the service provider’s response time to the issue and has been unable to cook or heat her home for more than a day.

“I have just had to throw away about £60 of frozen and refrigerated food. I can’t afford to do that at the moment,” she said.

“We do not have shops within walking distance.

“I am shocked at how long they have taken to fix this problem and that they have only offered us £30 a day per person for food and drinks.

“This time last year, my partner was on a feeding pump for three months as he has oesophageal cancer.

“If this had happened at this time last year, I have no idea what would have happened.”

SSEN thanks those affected customers for their patience and apologies for any inconvenience caused.