Blue Ridge Electric Continues Outage Restoration Despite Continuing High Winds
For Immediate Release
Contact: Grey Scheer, Director of Community Relations, Blue Ridge Electric Membership Corporation, (828) 759-8994.
Lenoir: (April 17, 2007 5:00 AM) - Blue Ridge Electric linemen and contractors continue outage restoration efforts today with additional assistance from several crews from sister cooperatives in North Carolina and Georgia. Overnight, despite continued high winds, crews were able to restore power to about 1,000 members.
The continued high winds have resulted in several repeat outages and a greater number of broken poles are being discovered. Caldwell County has experienced the greatest number of outages and broken poles since early Monday morning. Currently among the 3,031 members without power, 1,550 are from Caldwell County; 831 from Watauga County; 467 from Ashe County; and 183 from Alleghany County.
Blue Ridge Electric strives to restore electricity to as many members as possible with each restoration effort. It is possible for outages affecting smaller number of members will be restored after outages that affect a greater number of members. This means that while the majority of outages are restored within hours, some members have been without power for more than twenty hours.
For your safety, Blue Ridge Electric reminds all individuals to stay away from downed power lines since they can still be energized and therefore dangerous or even deadly. Even if your power has been restored there may still be downed lines in your area as new outages are continuing to occur and caution is still advised. Contact Blue Ridge or call 911 if you see a downed power line. Fortunately, there have been no reports of injury as a result of a downed power line.
Members that have not already reported their outage are encouraged to call the cooperative’s Powerline-its automated reporting system—at 1-800-448-2383 or contact their local office (Caldwell: 828-754-9071; Watauga: 828-264-8894; Ashe: 336-246-7138; Alleghany: 336-372-4646; Wilkes: 336-838-4655). Blue Ridge Electric is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It is not necessary to call to report your outage more than one time.
Blue Ridge Electric is a member-owned electric cooperative serving some 70,000 members in northwest North Carolina, including, Caldwell, Watauga, Ashe, Alleghany, Alexander, Wilkes and Avery counties.
