Co-op customers in dark due to APCO ‘failure’
NEW CASTLE – During recent thunderstorms and accompanying winds, power outages have happened more than usual in September.
Some who are Craig-Botetourt Electric Co-operative customers lost power for three hours on Sept. 9 – and it wasn’t even the electric co-op’s fault, according to the general manager.
APCO was responsible for the power outage that postponed the CCHS game, the Craig-Botetourt Electric Cooperative co-op manager says. Photo by Ann Harrell
Shawn Hildebrand explained Appalachian Power Co. had a failure in its system that put the Craig-Botetourt area in the dark
APCO spokesman John Shepelwich in the Roanoke office confirmed there was a technical problem on Sept. 9 with the feed from APCO to substations in Craig and Botetourt County.
“About 7:09 p.m. we had a report that one of our 69,000 volt lines, a transmission line, had locked out. Basically, it’s a circuit breaker and the power does not flow, he added.
That interrupted power to APCO’s Mount Union Station and New Castle stations, he said, as well as the Stone Coal Gap station in Botetourt and Meadow Creek station in Craig.
Shepelwich said about 2,200 APCO customers were affected, in addition to Craig-Botetourt. Service was restored at 10:46 p.m.
The football field at Craig County High School was one of the areas affected. The game between the Rockets and the Green Wave from Narrows had to be rescheduled and was played on Saturday afternoon. Craig ultimately came away with a 28-19 victory.
Those homes and businesses affected that day CBEC customers spread from New Castle and part of Botetourt to the communities of Bradshaw in Roanoke County and Elliston in Montgomery County.
Those were the same areas that lost power on Sept. 2 after strong and violent storms that tore down electrical lines and blew fuses, Hildebrand said.
“After the storms hit around 2:30 pm our crews responded to help make sure that the lights were restored as quickly and safely as possible,” Hildebrand wrote in the Co-op’s newsletter.
In the Bradshaw and Elliston areas there were two different pieces of line torn down by trees that were located off the right-of-way, he said.
“This is extremely frustrating not only for the member of the Cooperative but also for the Cooperative,” said Hildebrand, who added that last year CBEC maintained and cut the right-of-way areas where electric lines are located.
“It just goes to show that even though we do our jobs, there are still going to be times that the natural surroundings of the service territory is going to make it difficult to provide reliable electrical service.”
He urged customers of Craig-Botetourt Electric Cooperative who have outages or questions about what happened to contact him at the office, 540-864-5121, Ext. 122, or on his cell phone at 540-580-9495.
