On January 27–31, hundreds of thousands of homes in Victoria, including Melbourne, suffered various power failures as a result of a record heat wave. It is estimated that over 500,000 residents in Melbourne were without power for the evening of January 30, 2009. The outage affected much of central Melbourne with train and tram services cancelled, the evacuation of Crown Casino, traffic light failures, people being rescued from lifts and patrons of the Victorian Arts Centre evacuated and shows cancelled. The outage occurred only an hour after the National Electricity Market Management Company (NEMMCO) issued a statement saying load shedding was ending and power had been restored. Authorities say there had been a major electricity failure in the city's west, caused by the three-day heatwave. It is believed an explosion at South Morang contributed to the power problems along three transmission lines supplying Victoria's west and Victorian power supplier SP AusNet shed 1,000 megawatts. On January 30, Energy Minister Peter Batchelor announced that consumers who lost power for more than 20 hours would be eligible for compensation It is estimated that over 500,000 residents in Melbourne were without power for the evening of January 30, 2009.