I want to thank all of you who took the time to let me know about the power outage Tuesday night. There’s never a good time to lose electricity, but with our temperatures in the high 90s, this was one of the worst times.
I became aware that we were having a power issue at about 6 p.m. Tuesday as I took my son to football practice and noticed that the stop light at Rolling Oaks and Maumelle Boulevard wasn’t working. After a resident contacted me at 7 p.m. to report that power on Ridgeland had been out for several hours, I realized the problem wasn’t limited to just that intersection. From where I stood watching my son’s practice, I saw linemen and seven Entergy trucks near the soccer fields. Although I didn’t know exactly where the problem was, I knew Entergy was on the scene.
I immediately contacted my customer-service manager at Entergy, who lives in Maumelle. After he made some calls, he called back to tell me that about 2,400 customers were without electricity, and that approximately 20 Entergy linemen were on site. The representative told me the crew was replacing damaged equipment, and that the repair should be complete within an hour to an hour and a half.
At 11:24 p.m., when electricity still wasn’t back on, I contacted the Entergy rep for an update. He assured me the crew was working as fast as possible, and that they were in the “switching mode,” which means they were restoring power gradually to avoid a surge that could cause more difficulty.
As thousands of you are painfully aware, the power wasn’t fully restored until a few minutes past midnight.
Last weekend, the air conditioning at our home went out, so I know a little bit about what you all went through last night. My chief of staff was one of the Entergy customers who lost power, so she knows exactly how hot and dark the night was.
Today, I remained in contact with our service rep as the company continued its investigation into the cause of the outage. Entergy says the initial damage that eventually caused Tuesday’s outage occurred last week. Members of a crew who were installing sewer manholes damaged underground electric lines they were installing on private property in a subdivision that is under construction.
We will continue to monitor this situation and remain in contact with all parties to determine whether there are steps they can take to prevent similar damage in the future.
Original Source can be found here.
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