Power Cuts in Vung Tau

The electric people were doing something with wires during that period a couple of weeks ago in the areas that resulted in those two short localised power cuts in the late morning. Someone mentioned it to me, and I occasionally noticed the workers for a couple of days. This was near Front Beach and on Hoang Hoa Tham St.

I think it was a temporary event that affected limited areas, as the power remained on at my place.

In general, electricity seems to be quite stable in VT other than the scheduled power cuts, which are limited to small areas rather than the whole town and are conducted in rotation. When one occurs, I leave my place and go down the street to the areas that still have electricity.

However, one time several years ago, there was a fire near the main cable and the power was cut off for the whole town for about 3 or 4 hours. Anyway, we never know when the power might go off, so keep some candles/flashlights on hand and your power banks and batteries charged.

Here are two articles about that:

Massive fire leaves Vietnamese beach town in the dark
https://e.vnexpress.net/news/news/massi … 83382.html

Blackout hits entire Vung Tau as fire blazes near major power line
https://tuoitrenews.vn/news/society/201 … 43118.html

Power cut in VT is always announced in advance to the owners who registered with the power company for that paid service.  The advance time can be from one week to one day, but it's always there.

In 5 years since the building where we live was built, every power cut was announced to the owner ahead of time via text message.  In the last 16 months, my phone was listed as the alternate number with the power company, therefore the messages were also sent to me.  In short (pun unintended), we've never caught unprepared, or not yet anyway.

In this building, part of every room in every apartment is also run by solar power, so we're never without our floor fans and some lights, even when the shortage lasted 8 hours.

BTW, the last power cut on this block happened in late May, the 3rd so far this year (I've received 4 messages since the beginning of the year, but one of them was a false alarm.)

EVN stated a few years ago that there would be no more power cuts, but as usual it continues.

Ciambella wrote:

Power cut in VT is always announced in advance to the owners who registered with the power company for that paid service.  The advance time can be from one week to one day, but it's always there.
....

Not always. The power cuts on 02 February, 24 July and 27 July were all unannounced. Even the Manager in my hotel was caught with his pants down. (He usually zalo messages me if there is a scheduled power cut) After each of the above events, he confirmed that they were unscheduled due to 'unexpected events'.

Actually, in addition to the sms messages to owner/registered person, one can also check the EVN website for scheduled power cuts in your area. Just online search 'cắt điện vung tau' (electricity cut vung tau). The top result should be the schedule. Of course, there is no English version, so Vietnamese language skills or google translate skills will come in handy.

I checked this website schedule for dates 23 July to 28 July. Although there were power cuts in Vung Tau during this period, none were scheduled in our area - which confirms what my Manager said. i.e. they were due to unexpected events.

If I search for dates 07 August to 08 August, yesterday's power cut is listed. For reason (Lý do) it says 'Sửa chữa điện' (Electrical repairs). Actually, that reason pretty much stays constant with all the entries.

Like I said, as for the unscheduled ones, we have no idea what caused them. I'm nowhere near front beach area, so it's unlikely that those events affected our area. At least for the scheduled power cuts we can plan ahead. It's the sudden unscheduled ones that are of concern. Just think someone may have bought their favourite seafood from their favourite vendor, fresh as they like, and then started to cook. Suddenly there is a power cut for a couple of hours. Their meal could potentially be ruined.

http://pcbariavungtau.evnspc.vn/
Rick

The above link was for the EVN website for VT. http://pcbariavungtau.evnspc.vn

Today, there was supposed to be an 'all day' (0800-1600) power cut in the Phan Chu Trinh area. It's currently 1523 and it hasn't happened.

You bet! In QUANG HANH, between CAM PHA and HALONG, it was extreme.

Can an engineer share what's the root cause of most outages?

KruChris wrote:

You bet! In QUANG HANH, between CAM PHA and HALONG, it was extreme.

Can an engineer share what's the root cause of most outages?

I think its all about load shedding.

cruisemonkey wrote:

Today, there was supposed to be an 'all day' (0800-1600) power cut in the Phan Chu Trinh area. It's currently 1523 and it hasn't happened.

Sometimes, power company will cancel last minute and change the date. Happened with us (we are not so central as Phan Chu Trinh though).

Maybe they cancelled yours altogether. Can't imagine the tourist hub of VT being without power all day!.

p.s. I stayed in a hotel in Phan Chu Trinh for a while (5-6 months) and there was only two or three power cuts during my stay. Our hotel did have a generator. However, the security man was hesitant to turn it on, particularly if there was only a few guests. If you speak to him nicely or get reception staff involved then it would be turned on.

Was caught out by a long power cut on Wednesday 11 September. Manager at hotel insists that he was never notified in advance. I've suggested that he check the EVN website at least once a week, to which he agreed.

Soon after power cut, took most important items in my Fridge/Freezer to a nearby house (4-5Km away) for storage so they don't spoil. went back there around 4:30 pm to pick-up. Not much fun lugging around quite a bit of food stuff on a motorbike (without a good luggage compartment).

edit: our last long power cut was on 07 August 2019. Seems it's happening every month.

On PCT, our last power outage was supposed to be in May but was cancelled, so the last actual cut was in March.

KruChris wrote:

You bet! In QUANG HANH, between CAM PHA and HALONG, it was extreme.

Can an engineer share what's the root cause of most outages?

It’s the government not wanting you on the internet too long. It’s called parental guidance. You get an x amt of time online per day.

Ciambella wrote:

On PCT, our last power outage was supposed to be in May but was cancelled, so the last actual cut was in March.

If PCT means Phan Chu Trinh, then it means you are not the only one who's had their power cut cancelled. There was another poster from Phan CHu Trinh who had their's cancelled too. Mind you that was two weeks ago. I just checked the EVN schedule and it seems because that road is quite long, not all of it comes under one area (as far as EVN is concerned).

I can see scheduled power cut entries for Phan Chu Trinh on:

1) 22/01/2019
2) 18/02/2019
3) 01/03/2019
4) 29/03/2019
5) 08/04/2019
6) 18/04/2019
7) 15/05/2019
8) 17/06/2019

some entries say 'Một phần đường Phan Chu Trinh thuộc phường 2' (A part of Phan Chu Trinh street that belongs to ward 2), which leads me to believe that part of phan chu trinh belongs to another ward other than ward 2. But looking at google maps I can see that all of phan chu trinh comes under ward 2. If I'm not mistaken it's the road that starts at Thùy Vân and goes all the way to the T-intersection junction with Nguyễn Trường Tộ. At this point Phan Chu trinh road finishes and Đinh Tiên Hoàng road starts.

Anyway, seems no part of Phan Chu trinh has had a scheduled power cut since June 2019. So, probably fair to say you are less likely to experience power cuts.

BTW, I just discovered that the EVN website only shows power cuts up to today. So, the manager at my hotel won't be able to rely on it to warn us of impending power cuts.

QuidProQuo wrote:

It’s the government not wanting you on the internet too long. It’s called parental guidance. You get an x amt of time online per day.

Conspiracy theory. 

The EVN website isn't showing any power cuts since 15 September.

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

sanooku wrote:

The EVN website isn't showing any power cuts since 15 September.

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

I went through ward 2 this morning and the power was off in certain areas.

colinoscapee wrote:

sanooku wrote:

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

I went through ward 2 this morning and the power was off in certain areas.

Yes... on Phan Chu Trinh it was off from around 08:30 to 14:40. No notice.

cruisemonkey wrote:

colinoscapee wrote:

sanooku wrote:

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

I went through ward 2 this morning and the power was off in certain areas.

Yes... on Phan Chu Trinh it was off from around 08:30 to 14:40. No notice.

EVN do shedding every day in VT.

cruisemonkey wrote:

colinoscapee wrote:

sanooku wrote:

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

I went through ward 2 this morning and the power was off in certain areas.

Yes... on Phan Chu Trinh it was off from around 08:30 to 14:40. No notice.

Must have been an isolated section of the street.

I was inside during that time (on Phan Chu Trinh) and had uninterrupted A/C, etc

cruisemonkey wrote:

colinoscapee wrote:

sanooku wrote:

No more power cuts?....That'll be the day.

I went through ward 2 this morning and the power was off in certain areas.

Yes... on Phan Chu Trinh it was off from around 08:30 to 14:40. No notice.

On thursday last week, I went in into this shop at the big roundabout on Nguyễn An Ninh and Thống Nhất (Think it's ward 8). it was at around 12:30pm, and they did not have electricity. Sales girl told me power was due to come back around 2:30pm.

Luckily I only had to buy 1 item. Would have been a struggle otherwise. Couldn't see nowt in there.

colinoscapee wrote:

KruChris wrote:

You bet! In QUANG HANH, between CAM PHA and HALONG, it was extreme.

Can an engineer share what's the root cause of most outages?

I think its all about load shedding.

Soooo, we just arrived in Ketchikan Alaska last month and discovered that they had a "fuel oil surcharge" because they did not have enough hydro-power due to the lack of rainfall this past spring.

When I mentioned this to my wife (as of 17 august), she said they had the same problem in Vietnam.
But would cut power to places to reduce the load because they were not going to burn fuel when they could get "free" hydro power.

Makes sense to me and yet another lesson I learned about Vietnam !

The surprises keep on coming !!

I miss HCM a lot.

I had a brief outage this morning (before 6:30 AM) at my apartment on Phan Chu Trinh near Luca Restaurant.

I woke to my CPAP anti sleep apnea machine not working; not fun feeling suffocation.

Almost immediately the machine began working again.

Bedroom had gotten uncomfortably warm for sleeping and the A/C units were off but were able to be turned on again, so I'm guessing it was a very brief outage, probably an hour or so.

Wxx3 wrote:

colinoscapee wrote:

KruChris wrote:

You bet! In QUANG HANH, between CAM PHA and HALONG, it was extreme.

Can an engineer share what's the root cause of most outages?

I think its all about load shedding.

Soooo, we just arrived in Ketchikan Alaska last month and discovered that they had a "fuel oil surcharge" because they did not have enough hydro-power due to the lack of rainfall this past spring.

When I mentioned this to my wife (as of 17 august), she said they had the same problem in Vietnam.
But would cut power to places to reduce the load because they were not going to burn fuel when they could get "free" hydro power.

Makes sense to me and yet another lesson I learned about Vietnam !

The surprises keep on coming !!

I miss HCM a lot.

It also doesnt help when VN is selling electricity to Cambodia.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I had a brief outage this morning (before 6:30 AM) at my apartment on Phan Chu Trinh near Luca Restaurant.

Bedroom had gotten uncomfortably warm for sleeping and the A/C units were off but were able to be turned on again, so I'm guessing it was a very brief outage, probably an hour or so.

There was an outage this morning around that time in the middle of Phan Chu Trinh (Hem 84), but it only lasted about five seconds.

The power just went out at Belly's on Phan Chu Trinh...for about 5 seconds 

cruisemonkey wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I had a brief outage this morning (before 6:30 AM) at my apartment on Phan Chu Trinh near Luca Restaurant.

Bedroom had gotten uncomfortably warm for sleeping and the A/C units were off but were able to be turned on again, so I'm guessing it was a very brief outage, probably an hour or so.

There was an outage this morning around that time in the middle of Phan Chu Trinh (Hem 84), but it only lasted about five seconds.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

The power just went out at Belly's on Phan Chu Trinh...for about 5 seconds 

You Phan Chu Trinh lot are living the dream with your 5 second power cuts. We had one last night (this morning) from around 12 midnight to 2 am, without any word of warning.

It was a muggy night last night without any hint of breeze. I sat in my apartment sweating, waiting for electricity to come back, then shower and go to bed. It was 3 am when I finally hit the sack.

If it continues like this, I may just move to Malaysia. Three months there from March to June this year. Not one power cut.

sanooku wrote:

cruisemonkey wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I had a brief outage this morning (before 6:30 AM) at my apartment on Phan Chu Trinh near Luca Restaurant.

Bedroom had gotten uncomfortably warm for sleeping and the A/C units were off but were able to be turned on again, so I'm guessing it was a very brief outage, probably an hour or so.

There was an outage this morning around that time in the middle of Phan Chu Trinh (Hem 84), but it only lasted about five seconds.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

The power just went out at Belly's on Phan Chu Trinh...for about 5 seconds 

You Phan Chu Trinh lot are living the dream with your 5 second power cuts. We had one last night (this morning) from around 12 midnight to 2 am, without any word of warning.

It was a muggy night last night without any hint of breeze. I sat in my apartment sweating, waiting for electricity to come back, then shower and go to bed. It was 3 am when I finally hit the sack.

If it continues like this, I may just move to Malaysia. Three months there from March to June this year. Not one power cut.

Or, maybe move to Phan Chu Trinh?

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

.....
Or, maybe move to Phan Chu Trinh?

Been there, done that, have t-shirt. Area too touristy. 

Anyway, didn't you say there was a power cut for about 1 hour recently.

sanooku wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

.....
Or, maybe move to Phan Chu Trinh?

Been there, done that, have t-shirt. Area too touristy. 

Anyway, didn't you say there was a power cut for about 1 hour recently.

I thought so, but I was asleep.

Someone else with more knowledge said it was only five minutes.

I guess 5 minutes can feel like 1 hour when I wake up feeling suffocated by my inoperable breathing machine.

Guess I'll look into a reliable battery backup.

You are right about the touristy feel to the area.

So far it's not bothering me much as I navigate my way to mostly Vietnamese merchants.

sanooku wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

.....
Or, maybe move to Phan Chu Trinh?

Been there, done that, have t-shirt. Area too touristy. 

Anyway, didn't you say there was a power cut for about 1 hour recently.

I lived in a hem off PCT street, and it definitely wasnt touristy.

colinoscapee wrote:

sanooku wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

.....
Or, maybe move to Phan Chu Trinh?

Been there, done that, have t-shirt. Area too touristy. 

Anyway, didn't you say there was a power cut for about 1 hour recently.

I lived in a hem off PCT street, and it definitely wasnt touristy.

I wonder: When we say "touristy" are we talking about Western foreigners and the joints they (we) frequent, or the influx of Vietnamese tourists, mostly on weekends and holidays?

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I wonder: When we say "touristy" are we talking about Western foreigners and the joints they (we) frequent, or the influx of Vietnamese tourists, mostly on weekends and holidays?

The former.  But if they're expats who have lived here long enough to be part of the local scene then they're not tourists, and the places they hang out daily are not touristy spots.

Some Vietnamese tourists in VT are not actually tourists either.  Quite a few of them have their second homes here, or come to stay with their families who live here, or use their companies' retreats regularly.  They're here too routinely to be considered tourists.

Ciambella wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I wonder: When we say "touristy" are we talking about Western foreigners and the joints they (we) frequent, or the influx of Vietnamese tourists, mostly on weekends and holidays?

The former. ....

That makes sense (by vietnamese standards/logic). Places frequented by foreign tourists encounter less electricity cuts as it may impact tourism.

We wouldn't want a German tourist here on holiday (staying at PCT) for one week going back to Germany and telling all his friends,colleagues and family that his holiday was plagued with long power cuts, would we?

Ciambella wrote:

Some Vietnamese tourists in VT are not actually tourists either.  Quite a few of them have their second homes here, or come to stay with their families who live here, or use their companies' retreats regularly.  They're here too routinely to be considered tourists.

We need a word for the 'middle ground' between: tourist and Saigonista. 

One of the first things I did after I found my apartment was install a gas stove. Adaptability and diversification are key to living comfortably. I have: candles, batteries and an emergency light (there're not enough units in the building to justify having a generator... which is good... because it's quiet). 

On topic - no power cuts today (so far). 

cruisemonkey wrote:

....
One of the first things I did after I found my apartment was install a gas stove...

Just about have enough space for two electric hotplates in my apartment. If the power cuts continue, maybe I'll ask Manager if we can change the setup.

Adaptability and diversification are key to living comfortably.

sounds like a line from some marketing brochure. 

.. I have: candles, batteries and an emergency light..

You have candles?...are they the scented variety or normal?.
I have batteries. Unfortunately, they are not big enough to power a fridge and freezer for 8+ hours.

On topic - no power cuts today (so far). 

No. of course not. You live on PCT. 

sanooku wrote:

cruisemonkey wrote:

....
One of the first things I did after I found my apartment was install a gas stove...

Just about have enough space for two electric hotplates in my apartment. If the power cuts continue, maybe I'll ask Manager if we can change the setup.

Adaptability and diversification are key to living comfortably.

sounds like a line from some marketing brochure. 

.. I have: candles, batteries and an emergency light..

You have candles?...are they the scented variety or normal?.
I have batteries. Unfortunately, they are not big enough to power a fridge and freezer for 8+ hours.

On topic - no power cuts today (so far). 

No. of course not. You live on PCT. 

Trust me, they do get power cuts on PCT.

colinoscapee wrote:

...
Trust me, they do get power cuts on PCT.

only occasionally - as posters currently living there have confirmed.

Even then they last 5 seconds/minutes, not 8+ hours.

sanooku wrote:

colinoscapee wrote:

...
Trust me, they do get power cuts on PCT.

only occasionally - as posters currently living there have confirmed.

Even then they last 5 seconds/minutes, not 8+ hours.

We had powercuts there last year that lasted 9 hours.