Noida: Many parts of the city experienced power outages following storms early on the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday. The nearly 40-minute thunderstorm that started around 1.40am left residents without electricity for up to four hours in some areas, such as Vaishali, Vasundhara, Loni in Ghaziabad, and various Noida sectors, where power supply was disrupted until 6am on Sunday. As trees fell in dense green areas, leading to cable and pole snags, pre-emptive shutdowns were implemented, but outages lasted from 3 to 7 hours in affected areas. Ghaziabad's Vaishali, Vasundhara, Loni, and Noida sectors 122, 62, 71, 82 faced prolonged disruptions. Some areas also experienced water supply issues, while Sector 19 saw water logging due to ongoing drain work.Sanjay Sharma from Sector 6 Vaishali, Ghaziabad, told TOI that the area had no power from 1.40am to 7.30am, adding that power officials blamed a back-end shutdown.While Meena Bhandari from Abhay Khand HIG flats reported very low voltage, leaving no power to operate the motor to pump water in the morning. Naresh Bharti, chief engineer, Ghaziabad power department zone 2, told TOI that supply was hit due to faults at Ravli and Kakda substations in Muradnagar and Modinagar. He added that repairs were completed, and power was restored by 10:45 am. Power in Noida went out around 1.15am across most sectors and was restored between 5.:30am

and 6.30am, though some areas faced longer outages due to work related to tree falls, with disruptions continuing past 7 am. Tree fall incidents were reported in Sectors 53, 34, 35, 55, and Arun Vihar, among others. Virendra Singh Negi, RWA general secretary of Sector 53, informed that a neem tree had uprooted and fallen on the road near C-23/C-43 in Sector 53, blocking the road.Noida Authority's horticulture team came later to clear the fallen trees in several sectors, which were cleared post noon in most areas. VK Kapoor, RWA president of Sector 33, maintained that since rain and thunderstorms are a frequent issue, the need of the hour for all sectors is to ensure a dedicated team for pruning trees. "Pruning should clear all conductors. If not done now, then all sectors will continue to face shutdowns of more than 4 hours," he said. Power outage also disrupted the water supply in some areas on Sunday morning. Krishna Tyagi, AOA president of Kendriya Vihar 2 in Sector 82, stated that their area had no water due to the lack of a power backup system in the sector's pump house.

"As soon as the power goes off, the water supply stops, and the residents are forced to live without electricity and water. The authority should make arrangements for power backup in all pump houses.

This issue was also raised in the meeting of the Noida MLA earlier," he said..While KK Jain, secretary general of FONRWA, who received complaints from various sectors on tree and outage issues, said that the federation members were in touch with the horticulture department, which led to trees being removed later in the day in many sectors.