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- 19. November 2008: Cleveland Ohio - Outage left 15,000 customers in the dark
- 17. November 2008: Hydro One restores power to more than 120,000 customers in the wake of winter storm
- 16. November 2008: 35 thousand homes in Ontario without power due to storm
- 15. November 2008: Rolling Blackouts in Los Angeles due to Massive Fire in Sylmar
- 10. November 2008: Power cut to more than 12,000 Hydro One customers north of Toronto
- 6. November 2008: Portable Generators Recalled by General Power Products Due to Fire Hazard
- 31. October 2008: Half of Penetang faces blackout next weekend
- 30. October 2008: Diesel Generator powered multi-million dollar marijuana operation
- 30. October 2008: Power restored to thousands of Ont., Que. residents
- 29. October 2008: Crews restore power to 4,000 in Salt Lake City after morning blackout
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Hydro One restores power to more than 120,000 customers in the wake of winter storm
17. November 2008 by admin.
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Visit www.AuroraGenerators.com Don’t get left in the dark!
Hydro One restores power to more than 120,000 customers in the wake of winter storm
TORONTO, Nov. 17 /CNW/ - Hydro One has restored power to more than
120,000 customers affected by high winds and heavy snow that began late
Saturday night. The Company is still working to restore electricity to the
approximately 36,000 Hydro One customers who are still without power this
morning.
Hydro One crews have been busy assessing and repairing the damage
resulting from the storm since early Saturday evening. Crews report that they
continue to see significant numbers of downed poles and trees on lines. While
poor weather has mostly subsided, some areas continue to experience windy
conditions which are hampering efforts and bringing new outages.
Crews are being moved from across the province to aid in the restoration
effort, and more than 800 staff are involved. The Company expects that some
customers in the hardest hit and remote areas may be without power until later
this week. The Company will continue to update the status of its restoration
efforts.
<<
The most impacted areas include:
——————————————
Number of Hydro One
Area Most Impacted Customers Affected
——————————————
Penetanguishene 10,000
——————————————
Bracebridge 9,400
——————————————
Barrie 6,000
——————————————
Orillia 6,000
——————————————
Huntsville 4,000
——————————————
Minden 1,400
——————————————
>>
“Power outages in the winter are a serious concern for our customers and
we will do all possible to have people restored as quickly and safely as we
can,” said Myles D’Arcey, Senior Vice President, Customer Operations, Hydro
One. “We will continue to deploy all available resources to restore power and
as power is restored in one area, crews will be redeployed to assist with
further restoration efforts.”
Important Safety Information
Hydro One strongly urges people to take extra precaution near fallen
power lines. Even if a fallen wire seems dead, it can be dangerous. People are
urged to report to Hydro One the location of the fallen wires as soon as
possible. Touching a vehicle that is in contact with a power line can be
fatal.
For the most recent information on power outages go to
www.HydroOneNetworks.com.
Hydro One delivers electricity safely, reliably and responsibly to homes
and businesses across the province of Ontario and owns and operates Ontario’s
28,000 kilometre high-voltage transmission network that delivers electricity
to large industrial customers and municipal utilities, and a 125,000 kilometre
low-voltage distribution system that serves about 1.3 million end-use
customers and smaller municipal utilities in the province. Hydro One is wholly
owned by the Province of Ontario.
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35 thousand homes in Ontario without power due to storm
16. November 2008 by admin.
Need a generator? You can pick one up from www.AuroraGenerators.com
Thousands of homes in our region are without power today.
Hydro One says 35 thousand homes in Penetanguishene, Orillia, Huntsville and Bracebridge are in the dark.
That’s out of a total of 45 thousand hydro one customers across the province without power.
About 27 hundred homes in Collingwood, Essa Township and Sunnidale Corners are also without power.
Hydro One Spokesperson Corey Labatt says the wintery weather has knocked out the power and downed trees.
He says their helicopters are grounded so they can’t even assess some of the damage in some more remote areas.
Labatt says they will bringing in crews from across the province to get power back on hopefully by the end of the day, but some homes may have to go another night without hydro.
He adds power is likely to go off and on through out the day as the storm continues, particularly to the north of us.
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Power cut to more than 12,000 Hydro One customers north of Toronto
10. November 2008 by admin.
TORONTO — Electricity has been cut to more than over 12,000 Hydro One customers north of Toronto.The utility’s website says over 10,800 customers were affected shortly after 10 a.m. in King City, Uxbridge, Markham and surrounding areas, The cause of the outage has not yet been determined, but Hydro One says service is expected to be restored by just after 1 p.m.
Another outage hit 1,500 customers in the Bracebridge area.
Most of those homes and businesses are expected to have their electricity back between 12 p.m. and 12:45 p.m.
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Half of Penetang faces blackout next weekend
31. October 2008 by admin.
Half of Penetang faces blackout next weekend
(OSPREY) — A large portion of the eastern half of Penetanguishene will face a blackout on Saturday, Nov. 8, from 7 a. m. to 6 p. m.
Barrie Hydro says it will be turning off the power to an area east from Main Street to Fuller Avenue and from Brunelle Sideroad to the Mental Health Centre Penetanguishene. The outage will affect about 2,400 Hydro customers.
Penetanguishene General Hospital will not be affected because the switching will be configured to allow the hospital to remain in service.
A letter from Barrie Hydro to the town said that Tech Form requested an outage on two of its customer-owned stations on Centennial Drive.
“In order for this work to be completed safely,” said the letter, “Barrie Hydro needs to arrange an outage which will effect two other customer-owned substations, as well as the municipal substation located on Centennial Drive.”
The letter from John Hamilton said Barrie Hydro acknowledge that outages of this type are disruptive to both residential and industrial customers. However, it added, “the safety of workers and members of the public must take priority.”
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Power restored to thousands of Ont., Que. residents
30. October 2008 by admin.
Power has been restored to thousands of residents who were stuck in the dark Wednesday after a fierce storm blew through eastern Ontario and western Quebec the previous night.
The storm left behind as much as 15 centimetres of snow and thousands of homes and businesses were without power.
Wet, heavy snow downed tree branches and power lines, knocking out power for about 22,000 Hydro One customers in eastern Ontario and more than 70,000 customers in Quebec.
In Ontario, the majority of power outages hit east of highway 4-16 to the Quebec border and included Winchester, Arnprior, Brockville and Vankleek Hill.
As of Wednesday evening, roughly 8,000 homes and businesses were still without power.
In Quebec, the number of households without power was down in the evening to 51,000, from as much as 70,000 earlier in the day.
There are now 150 repair crews working around the clock to restore power to the affected areas, which include:
- more than 31,000 customers in the hard-hit Laurentians;
- some 5,600 homes in Mont Tremblant;
- 2,000 residences in La Minerve, a town north of Mont Tremblant;
- 4,000 residences in St. Adolphe d’Howard
- about 2,700 customers in the Lanaudieres
In the Outaouais region, Gatineau has been restored, but there are still 17,000 clients in other areas (down from nearly 30,000) that are still affected.
Hydro crews in Quebec cannot speculate when full power will be restored, CTV Montreal reported.
The good news for trick-or-treaters is that all snow should be melted in time for Halloween night, as temperatures are expected to rise throughout the region toward the end of the week.
The forecast for Ottawa calls for rain and a temperature of 12 C for Halloween.
The storm blew north from the east coast of the U.S., which saw anywhere from five to 30 centimetres of snow Tuesday, causing power outages and road and school closures throughout New York State, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Eastern Ontario’s first snowfall came early this year. Last year’s first major storm hit the area on November 16.
The 2007/2008 winter season was one of the snowiest in recent memory for the region, as snowfall levels approached the 1970-71 record of 441.1 centimetres.
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City braces for an ugly morning rush hour Ottawa
29. October 2008 by admin.
Don’t get left in the dark - Buy a backup power generator before the lights go out.
City braces for an ugly morning rush hour
Last night’s rush hour went smoothly as motorists hurried home to beat the predicted storm, but it’s unlikely this morning’s will go as well.
Snow from the season’s first major winter storm, mixed with rain, began falling about 6 p.m. and continued through the night in Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec.
When it stops today, there could be as much as 15 centimetres of wet snow on the ground, said Environment Canada — an amount that flirts with the record for the day. On Oct. 28, 1962, the Ottawa airport recorded a fall of 15.5 centimetres.
Dan O’Keefe, the city’s road maintenance manager, yesterday urged drivers to adjust their driving to conditions and show some patience during the morning commute.
“I imagine the morning will be slow,” he said.
About 75 per cent of the city’s snow-clearing equipment is set and ready to go, he said. The rest is still being used to finish jobs from the summer.
Contractors are still busy with construction, although some have committed to helping out as required.
“We have everything ready that we could get our hands on,” Mr. O’Keefe said, adding that preparations had been under way since the city learned of the threat Monday.
Because winds were expected to gust to up to 70 km/h overnight, and leaves remain on many trees in the Ottawa Valley and the Outaouais, there was a danger that overloaded branches would break and take down power lines.
Several hundred Hydro One customers throughout the Valley had lost power by early evening. However, the cause of these outages had mostly not been determined.
As of about 9 p.m., Hydro Ottawa was reporting a number of outages across the city, likely weather related, a spokeswoman said.
Earlier in the day, people were rushing to get snow tires put on their vehicles, buy shovels and salt, or to arrange to have their snow-clearing contractor lined up for an early start.
Some retailers and snow removal companies said yesterday’s business was normal, while others experienced a jump in sales and service requests.
Business at Canadian Tire was “already brisk” by opening, said Glen Anderson, general manager of the Coventry Road store.
“We had 40 customers in a lineup before 7 a.m.,” he said, adding that this could continue through the weekend.
He said his store was stocked with snow equipment and does not expect to sell out in the next few days.
“This is what happens every year when there’s snow,” said Sandro Giaccone, manager of Frisby Tire on Clyde Avenue.
After last year’s near record snowfall, people bought snow tires earlier this year, but waited until the threat of the first snowfall to have them installed, he said.
In that respect, this year is “no different than any other,” he said. “Snow gets everybody moving.”
Retailers predict the supply of snow tires won’t be affected by a new law in Quebec, which requires all vehicles with Quebec license plates to have winter tires.
“It (was) business as usual,” said Chad Messier, manager of Wal-Mart on Bank Street. He said the store was busy, but no more so than most days.
Snowblower dealers, such as the Ottawa Goodtime Centre, were seeing increased sales over the year for the machines, which cost more than $1,000 on average.
“We’ve been selling huge numbers of these things since March 1, each and every day,” said general manager Bryan Thomas. He said snowblower inventory in almost every store in Ottawa is very low because of last year’s winter.
B&T MacFarlane, on Slack Road in Nepean, began selling snowblowers in August.
Salesman Ron Hrycak said he’d never seen that before — the machines usually start moving in late November — but people were motivated to get an early start after last year, which saw a total of 444.1 centimetres of snow.
“Last year kind of opened our eyes to a lot of things,” he said.
Appleseed Snowblowing was so busy yesterday that calls could not not answered personally. A three-minute message informed callers that there would be no snow removal today because most equipment arrives at the end of the month and the crews won’t be organized until Nov. 5.
There is some good news, though. This snowfall should quickly vanish under the warm conditions expected tomorrow and Friday.
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Cause of blackout remains a mystery
15. October 2008 by admin.
The exact cause of the power blackout on southern Vancouver Island Sunday is still a mystery.
B.C. Transmission Corp. staff are continuing to pore over computer data logs, which record data in milliseconds, corporation spokesman Mike Witherly said yesterday.
“It’s quite a sophisticated computerized system that monitors the power throughout the province,” he said. “They are going to be looking for the tiniest little changes to try to get to the bottom of exactly what happened.”
He could not say how long it would take to pinpoint the cause.
A circuit imbalance in the transmission system delivering power to other lines tripped the protection and control system, shutting off power to homes from Ladysmith to Victoria about 5:45 p.m. All lines were back in service by 8 p.m. that night.
The power outage trapped some people in elevators and took place as thousands of families were preparing Thanksgiving meals.
No equipment was damaged, Witherly said.
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More than 13,000 Hydro One customers without power across Ontario (Ont-Hydro-Outages)
14. October 2008 by admin.
TORONTO _ More than 13,000 Hydro One customers across parts of central and northern Ontario are without power this afternoon.
Hydro One has not yet specified a reason for the outages.
But it comes as blustery conditions are expected ahead of a cold front moving across the province.
A wind warning covering the Parry Sound, North Bay and Kirkland Lake areas has been issued, with gusts up to 90 kilometres an hour expected.
Nearly half of the customers affected _ or about 5, 900 _ are in the Sudbury area.
Other regions with significant numbers affected by outages include Timmins, Kapuskasing, Kirkland Lake, Parry Sound and Huntsville.
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Vancouver Island power failure hits 20,000
13. October 2008 by admin.
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Sunday, October 12, 2008
VICTORIA - A massive power outage that caused many Vancouver Island families to eat Thanksgiving dinner by candlelight created chaos for the island’s emergency workers.
Firefighters and police officers responded to dozens of burglar alarms and calls from people trapped in elevators.
“It was mayhem,” said Victoria firefighter Patricia Core. “Every line was lit up and it was impossible to keep up. It was craziness. I’ve never seen it like that in here.”
Firefighters responded to “multiple, multiple” calls from people trapped in elevators and alarms sounding. “There were no tragedies, thank goodness,” Core said.
Others mistook the smoke from generators starting up to be fires. More still called the fire department to find out why the city had slipped into darkness.
The massive power failure put much of southern Vancouver Island in the dark at about 5:40 p.m. PT. About an hour later power was restored to areas around Victoria. The rest of the Island was back on the power grid shortly afterwards, said B.C. Hydro spokesman Ted Olynyk.
Saanich, B.C., Police Staff Sgt. Gary Schenk said much of the chaos for police started when the power was re-started about 6:40 p.m.
“I can’t remember a power outage of this scope,” Schenk said. While some traffic lights continued to function on back-up power at major intersections, other lights were out during the power outage. There were no known traffic accidents as a result, Schenk said. “We’re relieved it was as short as it was,” Schenk said.
However, when the lights came back on, it seemed like “basically half the alarms in the municipality went off,” he said. Because police couldn’t assume the alarms going off in businesses and households were false, officers were sent out to investigate each call.
“They just kept going to the next one, and the next one, until they were all done,” he said.
Although Saanich, a city in the greater Victoria region, has a three-strikes policy for false alarms at homes and businesses which can result in a hefty fine, the police cancelled the policy for Sunday night with the understanding the power failure was to blame. Meanwhile, the power failure turned out to be a blessing in disguise for some.
“Thankfully we had just finished cooking a huge spread for Thanksgiving dinner when the power went out so we lit candles and had a family feast by candle light,” said Victoria Times Colonist reader Matt Amedro in a post to the newspaper’s website. “It was nice.”
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Hydro One sends crews to assist with power restoration efforts in Ohio in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike
17. September 2008 by admin.
TORONTO, Sept. 17 /CNW/ - Hydro One announced today it has dispatched
crews to Ohio to assist with power restoration efforts after Hurricane Ike
devastated the State’s electricity system earlier this week. The Company will
send 170 line maintainers and other personnel as well as equipment to the
Columbus area.
In Ohio, where a state of emergency has been declared, more than
1.3 million homes and businesses have been without power since Monday. Ohio’s
American Electric Power (AEP) has asked Hydro One for assistance to repair its
badly damaged electricity infrastructure. Hydro One crews are expected to
remain in Ohio until Monday, working in the Columbus and Canton areas where
approximately 600,000 residents are without power.
“I am proud of the employees of Hydro One for lending their knowledge and
expertise in a time of great need,” said George Smitherman, Deputy Premier and
Minister of Energy and Infrastructure. “Hydro One’s commitment to corporate
citizenship demonstrates how organizations and people bound by a common
purpose can make a significant difference even in the aftermath of terrible
disasters.”
“Hydro One has a longstanding tradition of answering the call for help,”
said Laura Formusa, President and CEO, Hydro One. “Outages of this magnitude
can be crippling to any community. This is why our support to this restoration
effort is so important.”
Hydro One has reciprocal agreements in place with North American
utilities to provide assistance during significant power outages. Hydro One
crews have assisted U.S. utilities following other emergencies, including
providing assistance to the State of Florida following hurricanes in 2004 and
2005. In 2006, the Company dispatched crews to Buffalo, New York to assist
with power restoration following a freak snow storm. In 2007, the Company also
dispatched crews to Vermont following a severe weather event that resulted in
significant outages.
Hydro One delivers electricity safely, reliably and responsibly to homes
and businesses across the province of Ontario and owns and operates Ontario’s
29,000 kilometre high-voltage transmission network that delivers electricity
to large industrial customers and municipal utilities, and a 122,000 kilometre
low-voltage distribution system that serves about 1.3 million end-use
customers and smaller municipal utilities in the province. Hydro One is wholly
owned by the Province of Ontario.
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