Load shedding update for Friday – here’s the new schedule

After announcing all-day load shedding for Friday, Eskom says it will now suspend load shedding during the day thanks to reduced demand and fewer breakdowns.

Load shedding will now be suspended at 10h00 until 16h00 on Friday. Thereafter, stage 2 load shedding will resume at 16h00 until 05h00 on Saturday, as previously communicated.

Eskom will communicate the outlook for the long weekend in the afternoon.

The new schedule is as follows:

Friday, 22 September

• Stage 1: until 10h00
• Suspended: 10h00 to 16h00
• Stage 2: 16h00 to 00h00

Saturday, 23 September

• Stage 2: 00h00 to 05h00
• Stage TBD: 05h00 onward

Eskom has taken a very different approach to load shedding this week, moving away from set schedules and instead giving daily updates and changes on the fly, depending on the status of the grid.

This has allowed the group to suspend load shedding for most of the week – a major change from indefinite stage 6 load shedding that hit most of last week.

Schedules 

For people living in the major metros, load shedding schedules are available here:

• City of Johannesburg
• City of Ekurhuleni 
• City of Tshwane 
• City of Cape Town (PDF)
• Nelson Mandela Bay
• eThekwini
• Manguang
• Buffalo City

For access to other load shedding schedules, Eskom has made them available on loadshedding.eskom.co.za.

Smartphone users can also download the app EskomSePush to receive push notifications when load shedding is implemented, as well as the times the area you are in will be off.

Read: Double trouble – South Africa heading for a new load shedding record