Durban sets back clock for Y2K

Durban Metro Electricity has "turned back the clock" by a full year in an effort to make "doubly sure" that no Y2K hitches could possibly cause a break in its power supply to the city.

The city's electricity department has back-dated some essential equipment to 1998 as a last line of defence against the possibility of large parts of the Durban area being plunged into darkness at the height of the millennium celebrations.

The back-dating means that when the millennium midnight strikes in the city, a whole string of electronic devices controlled by the electricity department will quietly click over to "January 1 1999".

The department's director of technical services, Roy Wienand, said the timing on certain electronic equipment had been set back to "make doubly sure" there would be no Y2K problems with the local supply.

"This is actually our fourth level of security," he said. "We have already taken all other possible precautions to make sure there are no problems on our side.

"For the past couple of years Eskom has been testing and re-testing all systems, and so have we. The manufacturers of our equipment have also issued certificates of compliance."

Wienand said his department had altered the timing on about 100 protection relays throughout the city.

He said the decision to do this had been taken because the relays were fitted with devices that recorded details - including the date - of any fault in the electricity supply on a particular circuit. "If there is a fault in the circuit, a breaker trips and the equipment records the event, the time and date.

"The equipment actually has no consequence for Y2K. It does not control anything; it merely date stamps the event.

"But to make absolutely certain that there are no hidden things in it that could cause problems, we have set back the time."