Adam Prudhomme
Editor
When Lennox and Addington County General Hospital needed to source an emergency power generator, local company Doornekamp Construction answered the call.
During some routine work on an electrical transformer, hospital staff needed to use the building’s emergency generator for a short period. The generator started and ran successfully for 15 minutes before shutting itself down. A re-start was tried and the same thing happened.
“Rarely does the hospital need the services of an emergency generator,” said LACGH CEO Wayne Coveyduck. “However, when it does, it is critical that it functions as it should. When the electrical power is interrupted at a hospital, we are without heating, lighting and air conditioning, we do not have the ability to prepare meals for our inpatient population, and our essential services, such as the operating room and intensive care unit, cannot function.”
Once staff realized they were without emergency backup power, they began a province wide search to source a mobile power supply.
“While making calls to industrial suppliers and rental facilities we weren’t coming up with anyone having a readily available unit,” said Coveyduck. “At the same time as these calls were being made, I contacted our town mayor, Marg Isbester, to ask her for any insight she might have. Marg said she would make a few calls and get back me. From there, in less than one hour, I was in contact with Chris Wager, Director of Infrastructure Services at L&A County who was in contact with Ben Doornekamp of Doornekamp Construction.”
As luck would have it, a company right in their own community had exactly what they needed.
“Mr. Doornekamp indicated that their company did in fact have a mobile power plant that would suit our needs and would be pleased to help us out,” said Coveyduck. “Mr. Doornekamp immediately connected with John Richardson, General Manager of the Doornekamp Aggregates Division and asked Mr. Richardson to organize to help us out. Mr. Richardson coordinated the sourcing, preparing, shipping, setting up, testing and startup of the generator on the hospital property on Wednesday Feb. 2. For good measure, Mr. Richardson organized to have a perimeter fence erected around the generator and ensured that the fence had the ability to be locked for everyone’s safety.”
Fortunately the faulty generator was discovered during a routine check and not during an actual emergency. Still it is reassuring to know that had the situation been dire, the community was there to help and the hospital is prepared while they replace the broken generator.
Coveyduck said the good news story highlighted the connectedness and generosity of the people in the L&A community.
“What else can I say besides a big thank you to each of these special people who dropped everything to make sure the hospital was well taken care of,” added Coveyduck.