By Afraa Kori
When the wind rises in the hills, so does the certainty of another blackout, leaving Gembrook and its neighbors in the dark once more.
An AusNet spokesperson said Gembrook has experienced three sustained (greater than three minutes) outages and three momentary (less than three minutes) outages in 2025.
“We acknowledge that this summer has been challenging for electricity customers as they have had to contend with bushfire risks and significant thunderstorm events.”
“Gembrook’s electricity supply is provided via a long powerline which extends northeast from Officer towards the foothills of the Mount Dandenong Ranges.
“This is exposed to high wind speeds and is in a highly vegetated area, which means it is susceptible to extreme weather events and prolonged outages. Accessing roads along this line can also pose a response time challenge, with crews contending with narrow rural roads which can be blocked or impeded during weather events.”
“We know how difficult it is to be without power, and we apologise for the inconvenience.”
For Pakenham Upper resident Natalia Pedan, life in the hills means constant adaptation and survival mode—leading to stress-related health issues.
The night she moved in during COVID, the power went out just as her husband left for a night shift.
“It was such an eerie experience, a feeling that you are utterly and completely alone in the planet,” she recalled.
“I felt like a witch of the Middle Ages, persecuted for daring to move to the Hills!” Real baptism by fire it was!”
The outage exposed how helpless she was without electricity, especially for remote work. “My first thought was, how do I even tell my boss I can’t work?” As an IT professional at a major bank, she quickly learned about generators, portable internet, batteries, and even working from her car.
During a major storm, Natalia’s family lost power for two weeks while battling COVID—unprepared, with no generator or camping stove.
“Who would have thought that in Metropolitan Melbourne, minutes from Pakenham hub life can be so different! In the middle of winter, while being really sick with no access to medical or other help, we had no hot water, no heating and were literally cooking whatever was still left in the fridge and pantry on a wood fire outside.”
To stay connected, she installed a costly landline, calling it “a lifeline” and keeps emergency numbers on paper—an ironic shift for someone in IT.
Natalia said the reliability of electricity here is not dissimilar to that in Ukraine during the war, where she’s originally from and where her son still lives.
“It’s simply embarrassing for electricity to be in this state for a metropolitan area of one of the most developed countries in the world!”
Post-COVID, she adapted by working from her car and commuting during outages. However, if her car breaks down, it becomes a major disaster—which has happened multiple times.
Many residents have spent thousands on generators to cope. One resident bought one, worried that he “can’t afford” to be without a phone due to his wife’s medical condition and her occasional need for a nebulizer.
Walter Berger, a Gembrook local of 25 years, believes outages have worsened over the past decade. His biggest frustration? Mobile and internet services failing due to limited tower backup. He switched to satellite internet but relies on a generator so he can continue working.
“All at my expense. All because of the unreliability of the privately owned powerline assets,” Walter said. “It should not be up to residents to address the shortcomings of the power distribution network.”
State Member for Monbulk, Daniela De Martino MP said “the increased frequency of climate change related severe weather events across the hills has made it very apparent that we must do more to better prepare for and respond to power outages, while supporting the communities most impacted.”
“Operational responses to prolonged power outages are being improved and the groundwork for a more reliable and adaptive electricity network to meet future challenges is being laid.”
“As a Government, we have undertaken extensive consultation to listen to affected communities, including here in Gembrook. I am thankful that locals have been so willing to engage in discussions with me and the Network Outage Review Panel about what more needs to be done. As a result, our Government has built a plan to drive better outcomes for all Victorians to ensure the resilience of our transmission network and power is restored as quickly as possible after storm events.”
Ausnet recently submitted a proposal to the Australian Energy Regulator to approve $3.5 billion in investment to upgrade the distribution network to improve its reliability and resilience.
The $3.5 billion is made up of:
– $1.35 billion to replace ageing assets so the network can continue to operate safely and reliably.
– $770 million to increase the capacity of the network, support customer growth and enable more customers to electrify their gas appliances and transport.
– $430 million to improve reliability for problem areas on the network and to make our network more resilient to extreme weather.
– $430 million on digital systems to maintain core services, improve our responsiveness to extreme weather events, and uplift customer experience.
– $240 million to integrate rooftop solar and large-scale wind and solar generators, putting downwards pressure on wholesale energy prices.
