Some County Residents Still Without Power
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
More than 62,000 northern Indiana homes and businesses remained without power Friday evening, a day after an ice storm toppled trees and power lines, and many faced the prospect of a cold, dark weekend.
North Indiana Public Service Co. crews continued to make progress in restoring electricity to customers who were affected by Wednesday night's storm and a second round of ice damage Thursday afternoon.
Heavy accumulations of ice downed power lines and damaged trees, which caused extensive damage to a widespread area across NIPSCO's service industry.
As of 8 a.m. Friday, in areas surrounding Plymouth, Goshen, Warsaw and Angola, about 11,500 customers were without power.
"Crews were working to restore the first group of customers who lost power after the storm, then we lost a second wave of customers to additional ice damage in the late afternoon," said Tom Retseck, NIPSCO Service Operations manager. "Although high winds today may cause additional outages, we have added crews from outside Indiana to the restoration effort. We expect to have most of the remaining customers back on tonight, however due to the extent of the damage, some areas on the east side of the service territory won't likely be restored until sometime Saturday."
NIPSCO will provide additional information as restoration activities continue. NIPSCO has increased staffing in its contact center to provide coverage for customers who continue to experience outages.
Customers are reminded to keep away from all downed power lines and to report such incidents to the NIPSCO phone center at 800-464-7726.
American Electric Power Co., which had about 49,000 customers in South Bend and Elkhart without power early Friday evening, said some homes might not have power restored until Monday.
'For people in more remote areas or those who have single-service type outages, it's going to take a while,' said Dave Switzer, AEP community service manager, whose home was still without power Friday afternoon.
Many of those involved cases where an individual power line or circuit feeding power to a single home had failed. Those customers may be without power until Monday because AEP is focusing first on fixing problems that can restore power to 500 to 1,000 customers at a time, said AEP spokesman Barry Visel.
Residents without power were urged to take steps to prevent their homes' pipes from freezing and also to seek warm shelter.
'We're telling people to look for warming areas in their communities or to look for neighbors who have power to get assistance,' NIPSCO spokesman Dave Ryan said.
At the height of the outages on Thursday, about 180,000 were without power, most of them in St. Joseph and Elkhart counties.
Some school districts in the South Bend area closed for a second day because so many schools were still without power.
NIPSCO crews said they hoped to have all power restored in Kosciusko County by Saturday. [[In-content Ad]]
More than 62,000 northern Indiana homes and businesses remained without power Friday evening, a day after an ice storm toppled trees and power lines, and many faced the prospect of a cold, dark weekend.
North Indiana Public Service Co. crews continued to make progress in restoring electricity to customers who were affected by Wednesday night's storm and a second round of ice damage Thursday afternoon.
Heavy accumulations of ice downed power lines and damaged trees, which caused extensive damage to a widespread area across NIPSCO's service industry.
As of 8 a.m. Friday, in areas surrounding Plymouth, Goshen, Warsaw and Angola, about 11,500 customers were without power.
"Crews were working to restore the first group of customers who lost power after the storm, then we lost a second wave of customers to additional ice damage in the late afternoon," said Tom Retseck, NIPSCO Service Operations manager. "Although high winds today may cause additional outages, we have added crews from outside Indiana to the restoration effort. We expect to have most of the remaining customers back on tonight, however due to the extent of the damage, some areas on the east side of the service territory won't likely be restored until sometime Saturday."
NIPSCO will provide additional information as restoration activities continue. NIPSCO has increased staffing in its contact center to provide coverage for customers who continue to experience outages.
Customers are reminded to keep away from all downed power lines and to report such incidents to the NIPSCO phone center at 800-464-7726.
American Electric Power Co., which had about 49,000 customers in South Bend and Elkhart without power early Friday evening, said some homes might not have power restored until Monday.
'For people in more remote areas or those who have single-service type outages, it's going to take a while,' said Dave Switzer, AEP community service manager, whose home was still without power Friday afternoon.
Many of those involved cases where an individual power line or circuit feeding power to a single home had failed. Those customers may be without power until Monday because AEP is focusing first on fixing problems that can restore power to 500 to 1,000 customers at a time, said AEP spokesman Barry Visel.
Residents without power were urged to take steps to prevent their homes' pipes from freezing and also to seek warm shelter.
'We're telling people to look for warming areas in their communities or to look for neighbors who have power to get assistance,' NIPSCO spokesman Dave Ryan said.
At the height of the outages on Thursday, about 180,000 were without power, most of them in St. Joseph and Elkhart counties.
Some school districts in the South Bend area closed for a second day because so many schools were still without power.
NIPSCO crews said they hoped to have all power restored in Kosciusko County by Saturday. [[In-content Ad]]