Power line Whitefish Energy worked on in Puerto Rico keeps failing

It’s been nearly two months since Category 4 Hurricane Maria slammed Puerto Rico, leaving behind immense devastation. On Wednesday morning, the island took another step backward, as the lights went off in San Juan once again. 

SEE ALSO: Google: Project Loon has provided internet access to 100,000 people in Puerto Rico

Shortly after the storm, the island’s government signed a controversial $300 million deal with a little-known Montana company known as Whitefish Energy to restore power to parts of the island. Yet the island continues to experience major problems with its fragile electrical grid.

As of Monday morning, power had been restored to about 50 percent of the island. That’s when a power line known as the Cambalache Manatee line failed, again, plunging San Juan and other cities into darkness. 

This is the second time in a week that this particular line has failed, affecting the parts of Puerto Rico that actually had restored power. 

On Tuesday, the first outage was blamed on “human error.”

It’s also the line that Whitefish Energy has worked on as part of their controversial, and now canceled, contract with the island. 

As Mashable’s own Andrew Freedman noted, the $300 million contract breaks down like so:

Those are big bucks for work on a line that seems to be repeatedly failing and already under intense scrutiny.

On Tuesday, officials were in the hot seat for a Congressional hearing. Documents released by the House Committee on Natural Resources showed that the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s (PREPA) contract with Whitefish was extremely troubling, particularly the approval of the contract despite internal calls of concern.

This is a developing story…

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