Compensation sought for negligent power outage estimated to have cost businesses tens of millions of dollars
A class action has been filed against Transpower, the state-owned electricity grid operator, and its lines maintenance contractor, Omexom arising out of a major power outage which occurred in June 2024. The class action seeks to recover losses on behalf of all Northland businesses that were impacted.
The outage was triggered when a Transpower transmission tower near Glorit collapsed during routine maintenance, cutting power to homes and businesses to most of the Northland region. The contractor performing the maintenance had removed all of the nuts from at least two of the tower legs at the same time, which was subsequently acknowledged to be outside of their standard practice.
An independent review by the Electricity Authority concluded the collapse was caused by “entirely avoidable” factors, including Transpower’s inadequate procedures and deficient training, which had already been the subject of a prior internal warning by a senior engineer.
Approximately 180,000 residents and 20,000 businesses were without power – some for several days.
The case is being run by two leading law firms, LeeSalmonLong and Piper Alderman, with backing from litigation funder, Omni Bridgeway.
David Bullock, partner of LeeSalmonLong says Transpower and Omexom’s contribution of $1 million to a regional resilience fund following the outage was unlikely to come close to reflecting the actual losses suffered by Northland businesses.
“The collapse of the tower and the power outage that followed were not the product of some uncontrollable event like a storm – they were the result of a significant failure of infrastructure management that should have been easily foreseen and avoided.”
“It can be difficult for individual business owners to challenge the power and influence of a state-owned enterprise, such as Transpower, and the financial resources of an entity like Omexom – a subsidiary of a multinational company. This lawsuit is about giving those businesses access to justice and an opportunity to group together to fight for compensation,” says Hannah Brown, Partner of Piper Alderman.
The lawsuit is intended to be run on an “opt-out” basis, meaning all businesses that were impacted by the incident will automatically be included once the claim is filed, but businesses will have the opportunity to opt out as part of the Court process if they wish to.
“Northland businesses should not have to shoulder the cost of an outage they could not control. Litigation funding will enable them to seek compensation collectively and efficiently, without bearing the costs and risks of litigation,” says Jacob Kerkin, Investment Manager at Omni Bridgeway in New Zealand.
“We don’t think it’s fair that impacted businesses have not been able to receive compensation for their losses, many of which are significant. This class action seeks to make this right,” says Ms Brown.
Business owners can register their details at and get further information and updates about the class action at https://portal.omnibridgeway.com/transpower.
A community meeting will also be held where people can find out more and ask questions directly. Details on this will be shared at a later date.
