Quetta shivers at minus four with low gas pressure

Low gas pressure increases hardship of people as they could not warm their homes and offices and prepare food

QUETTA:

People in Quetta were left shivering in sub-zero weather as gas supplies dwindled with falling temperature.

The city has been witnessing low gas pressure for the last few weeks and the situation got worse when mercury dropped to four degrees below zero.

The Met office has reported minus four degree Celsius recorded in Quetta valley on Monday. Though low temperatures in witner are nothing new, the shortage of gas for heating and cooking is a rather new issue the people of the Balochistan’s biggest city have to deal with. The low gas pressure has increased the hardship of people as they could not warm their homes and offices and prepare food.

According to Sui Southern Gas Company, the gap between supply and demand often widens in winter which leads to low gas pressure.

Earlier a fire broke out in the Purification Plant at the Sui gas field in Dera Bugti district on Saturday which forced suspension of gas supply to most parts of Balochistan province including the metropolis Quetta.

“The consumers have been receiving gas which is in pipeline, however, complete gas supply will be restored after completion of repair work of the gas plant,” an SSGC official said. Most parts of the provincial capital including Sariab, Satellite Town, Jinnah Town, Nawa Killi, Brewery Road, Spiny Road and others remained without gas supply on Monday.

Meanwhile, dogged by freezing cold and lack of piped gas for heating, the people of the most developed city of Balochistan were turning to traditional stoves that use coal and firewood.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 23^rd, 2014.