Cheers were heard at Waiakea Villas in Hilo on Sunday afternoon when power was restored following a nearly 16-day outage.

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Cheers were heard at Waiakea Villas in Hilo on Sunday afternoon when power was restored following a nearly 16-day outage.

Electricity was lost at the 200-plus unit apartment complex during Hurricane Lala, but the extended outage was due to issues with the property’s electrical equipment, according to Hawaiian Electric.

On-site property manager Ruston Swain said that a key part was sourced and installed over the weekend that allowed the complex to safely reenergize.

“The last part was the control power transformer,” he said. “So, that is the part that, it’s basically a safety mechanism. It makes sure that we can turn on and off the breaker.”

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Maintenance manager Gerald Tavares said work still needs to be done to ensure the stability of the electrical system going forward.

“They just did the minimal to get us up and running, so now we are taking the next steps to make it permanent,” he said. “Right now, we’re having our electrical contractor submit what we need to do to make that permanent.”

He said the on-site management team has been working with the Waiakea Villas board to make the necessary repairs.

“Whatever we bring up, they’re being very cooperative, and they are trying to make this place good again,” he said.

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Email Grace Inez Adams at [email protected].