Community Corner

Two Dozen in Richfield Area Still Don't Have Power

For a few, it's Day Five of doing without electricity, since the June 21, 2013 storms.

Nearly 20,000 customers remain without power after what Xcel Energy describes in media reports as the worst outage in state history. 

Xcel's outage map indicates about 24 customers in the Richfield area are without electrical service as of Tuesday at 1:30 p.m.—a few for as long as five days, following the intense round of summer storms at the end of last week. Some have an estimated time for restoration of service of 11 p.m. Wednesday. For 12 other Richfield customers who lost power Sunday, restoration was expected at just past noon on Tuesday and is currently in progress. 

Xcel Energy's update for Minnesota as of 11 a.m. Tuesday, July 25, 2013: 

We won't stop until the last customer is back in service

As of 11 a.m. CT today, Xcel Energy has restored power to 97 percent of the customers who experienced an outage during a wave of thunderstorms that rolled through the region over the weekend. Approximately 19,000 customers remain without power.

Find out what's happening in Richfieldwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

We expect to restore power to the vast majority of those customers by the end of day Wednesday, June 26.

If you are one of the customers still without power, we apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience. This marks the most severe storm outage event we have experienced in several years. And we have all available resources, including more than 1,100 workers from 15 states and 22 other companies making repairs around the clock to restore service.

Find out what's happening in Richfieldwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Reminders

• If the storm damaged your overhead mast, a pipe-like housing that connects overhead service wires to a home's meter, you must contact an electrician for repairs before we can reconnect service.

• Stay away from downed power lines and report their location at 1-800-895-1999. All downed power lines, even if they're not moving or sparking, are dangerous and should never be approached.

• Our restoration process prioritizes work as follows: 1) Situations that threaten public safety, such as live, downed wires; 2) Restore power to critical services such as hospitals, nursing homes and fire departments; 3) Repairs are then prioritized based on what will restore power to the largest number of customers most quickly.

• Even if you do not see crews from Xcel Energy or one of our partner utilities in your neighborhood, we are still at work restoring your service as the problem may not be close to your home. In addition, with the amount of trees and limbs down, we have tree clearing crews out in advance of the line crews to remove any branches from the lines.

• If you have not yet called to report your outage, or if you have called and the power in your neighborhood comes back on and your power is still out, please call 1-800-895-1999.

Additional Tips

• Leave one light switch turned on so you'll know when electricity service has been restored.

• Turn off other appliances such as the television, refrigerator and range. If they are left on during the outage, there's a chance of electrical overload when power is restored.

• Check on your neighbors, especially the elderly.


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