What did we do?
Raymond Island’s power supply is connected by an overhead powerline on Fort King Road, Paynesville running across the McMillans Strait in Gippsland Lakes.
In 2024, a marine incident damaged the powerline causing a power outage on Raymond Island. We deployed backup generators to the area while we repaired the powerline.
To prevent future incidents like this, we replaced the overhead line with a new underground cable to improve the power reliability to Raymond Island.
This upgrade also removes the requirement for vessel height restrictions at the northern end of McMillans Strait, which were previously in place due to the overhead powerline.
What did we do?
From early May to late July, we built the underground power supply between:
- 84 and 91 Fort King Road, Paynesville
- 145 and 165 Western Boulevard, Raymond Island.
Works on Fort King Road and Western Boulevard included:
- digging with a vacuum truck to locate underground services
- using large machinery to replace existing power poles with new ones
- underground boring works to install the new cable three metres below the seabed
- cable hauling works to recover the existing powerline.
During these works, you may notice:
- noise from machinery vehicles
- traffic controllers guiding pedestrians and road users safely around the works area
- on street parking restrictions near the work area
- digging in the nature strip
- reinstatement works – for example, restoring the area close to its original state.
Local impacts during construction
We needed to turn the power supply off at Raymond Island and parts of Paynesville to safely install the new power poles and switch supply over to the new underground cable. All affected customers were notified in advance via SMS or mail.