Essential Energy power outage halts Christmas trade for Holbrook businesses

The town's IGA supermarket is closed but has generator power to protect produce from the outage.

Essential Energy confirmed general network maintenance would take place between 9am and 3pm, with 1186 customers affected.

Martha Satchell, from regional gallery Satch and Co, said this was the second outage for Holbrook in as many weeks and the community had come to expect disruptions to supply.

"Two weeks out from Christmas, it is a bit of a pain," Mrs Satchell said.

"Most of the businesses in Holbrook, all of them that I know of, had to close today. It is one of the busiest days that we normally have."

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Some businesses, including the Riverina Hotel, Woomargama Hotel and Round Hill Hotel at Morven have remained open, relying on external power supply to keep their kitchens open.

Mrs Satchell said the gallery was notified of the maintenance a fortnight ago, with reminders sent on Thursday to prepare for the outage.

"For businesses it would be better if it wasn't two weeks out from Christmas, from that point of view, but obviously it needed to be done," she said.

"You get so used to it when you live out here, so I'm not really that phased."

Jindera and Holbrook swimming pools are shut for the day, with Greater Hume Council attributing the closure to the power outage.

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