UPDATE Friday 19th January
Power is still out on the fourth day of power outages, Friday 19th January, in large swathes of Western Australia, from Mundaring and Gidgegannup close to the coastal city of Perth, to Kalgoorlie in the outback, thousands of people are still without power. And without fuel. The lack of power has meant that people in Kalgoorlie have to drive to Kambalda, 80 kilometres away, just to get fuel, in the blazing heat of over 40 degrees, only to end up in a line of hundreds of cars waiting to buy fuel. They are unable to charge their phones. Some businesses have lost thousands of dollars.
The weather has been hot as well at the moment - over 40 degrees, particularly in the outback areas – it is the middle of a (normal for Western Australia) summer heatwave when a lot of people would be using their air-conditioners.
Damn. I just suffered frozen (but not burst) pipes and -29C windchill...damaged one faucet valve. Please send some of that global warming my way :-)