A diesel spillage at the SABC’s Radio Park building in Auckland Park, Johannesburg, which forced the evacuation of staff is currently being cleaned-up.
The public broadcaster’s internal systems had switched from City Power to its back-up generator following a power outage.
The SABC says the aging equipment failed and this led to the diesel tank overflowing and causing a large spillage of the fuel.
“Well there were some Johannesburg-based radio stations which were affected which meant that they had to go on automation and play music and ads. But we hopefully will resolve that situation so that everything will go back to normal,” explains the SABC spokesperson, Vuyo Mthembu.
Mthembu says they will monitor the situation to evaluate if they are in the clear.
“The mopping operation is currently taking place and we hope that it will be completed by today. But obviously we’ll monitor the situation and see whether employees need to come back tomorrow to the Radio Park building,” explains Mthembu.
Johannesburg Emergency Services have rejected earlier reports that there were people trapped inside the SABC’s Radio Park building in Auckland Park, following a diesel leak.
Emergency Services Spokesperson, Robert Mulaudzi says, “We can confirm that we managed to evacuate everyone from the building. Everyone has been accounted for. Most parts of the 15th floor is flooded with the diesel coming down to the 8th floor and then from the 8th floor coming down. You can actually smell even if you’re walking maybe from 6th floor going down. So the risk is that if we don’t control that spillage we might have a fire incident hence we are not going to leave here we will make sure that as the cleaning company is cleaning the area we are on site.”
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