NATIONAL Grid has apologised for its failure to provide a generator to help the family of a bedridden dying woman during a recent Wellington power cut despite her being on the firm’s priority register for assistance.

The 85-year-old woman, who is terminally ill with a form of dementia, relies on electricity to keep her hospital bed mattress inflated.

But, the bed deflated when 144 properties in the Tonedale area lost power for several hours overnight on August 14 to 15.

Her daughter, Ellie King, said her mother was left lying on the metal frame of the bed.

Mrs King said her father called National Grid after receiving an alert that power was to be cut off, but the company said it could not help because it expected the outage to be shortlived.

She said: “My mum was given five months to live, approaching three years ago.

“She cannot get out of bed without a hoist and two people to operate it.

“Previously, portable generators have been delivered for my mum’s hospital bed and equipment.”

Mrs King said when electricity had been lost in the evening her father again called National Grid but was told it did no have the time and resources to drop off generators.

She said her husband Ben and their 15-year-old twin sons William and George managed in the dark to find an old generator in a garage and drag it to the house.

However, it took 45 minutes working outside in darkness to get it to turn over, and ‘just about run’.

Mrs King said: “My mum’s bed had basically entirely deflated with her stuck sat up and on the metal bones of the bed after just 30 minutes.”

She said a concern was that other elderly people in need might not be fortunate enough to have such family help available.

The power cut had been caused by a transformer fault and although supplies were initially restored after about 90 minutes, electricity was lost again for some hours overnight.

A National Grid Electricity Distribution (NGED) spokesperson told the Wellington Weekly the firm was sorry for the distress which had been caused to the family.

They said: “We recognise being without electricity can be particularly concerning for customers who rely on care or medical equipment, and we understand the anxiety this will have caused.

“Following a request for a generator, our teams assessed the situation.

“Based on information from engineers on site that power would be restored before a generator could be delivered, a decision was taken to prioritise restoring supplies as quickly as possible.

“We subsequently spoke with the family, who confirmed a generator provided by a family member was running and that the airflow mattress was inflating.

“During the call, we checked on her welfare and advised the family to contact us again if any further support was needed.

“The priority services register is designed to provide extra support to customers in vulnerable circumstances during outages, and we take our responsibilities to customers on the register seriously.”