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Screens show outages, status of equipment
By Bill Lilley
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Tuesday, Sep 16, 2008
An ardent Steelers hater, Steve Strah was geared up to spend Sunday night in front of a large-screen TV watching the Cleveland-Pittsburgh extravaganza.
He ended up staring at the biggest screens in Akron. But it wasn't football that captured his attention.
Strah, the regional president of Ohio Edison, spent most of Sunday and all day Monday tracking storm damage on three giant screens — each 15 feet high and 25 feet wide — in the company's Regional Dispatching Center.
''In my 24 years with the company, it is the worst, most devastating storm I've ever seen,'' Strah said.
Ellen Raines, director of public relations for Ohio Edison parent FirstEnergy, said the nerve center in West Akron took 190,000 outage calls Sunday as the remnants of Hurricane Ike roared through the area.
''It is the worst storm in our history,'' Raines said.
The numbers bear that out.
The storm took down 10,000 to 12,000 wires, cutting power to 520,000 of Ohio Edison's 1.2 million customers. The only larger outage was the non-storm-related blackout on Aug. 14, 2003, that darkened much of the Northeast United States and Ontario, Canada.
FirstEnergy spokesman Mark Durbin said power might not be restored to all customers until Friday.
Gov. Ted Strickland said about 2 million customers in Ohio lost power in the wake of Sunday's storm.
Shelly DiMattio, corporate communications coordinator for American Electric Power, said that 633,000 of AEP's 1.5 million customers in Ohio lost power. Among the hardest-hit areas was Stark County, where 60,000 of 102,000 customers were affected.
Long strong winds
What made Sunday's storm especially damaging was the strength and duration of the winds. The storm lasted nearly 10 hours and featured gusts up to 70 mph.
''It's a rare storm from the standpoint of square mileage it covered and the ferocity of the winds,'' Strah said.
Strah was shocked that Hurricane Ike still packed such a punch more than 1,200 miles from the Texas coast, where it came ashore.
''I was totally amazed by the energy mass, especially in how it can go this far and still be as strong as it was,'' he said.
Another reason for the widespread outages was the path of the storm.
''Storms usually go west to east, but this one was unusual because it came up from the southwest and moved northeast,'' Raines said. ''It basically traveled a path along the configuration of the Ohio Edison system.''
3 zones, 3 screens
Ohio Edison divides its system into three districts. The Southern zone takes in Mansfield, Marion and Springfield. The Central zone is the Akron area. And the Eastern zone is Youngstown and Warren.
Each of the zones is monitored by its own giant screen at the Regional Dispatching Center. The 8,000-square-foot facility was renovated two years ago with state-of-art electronics. It also has multiple generators to keep it powered at all times.
The center ''was an excellent investment because it enables us to provide better response because it consolidates all of the dispatchers,'' Strah said. ''They help to dispatch crews and manage the flow.''
The three screens show the status of equipment throughout the three Ohio Edison regions.
Staffers monitor customer outages along with the weather in a library-like atmosphere.
''The room was designed to be quiet and allow for a very productive work environment,'' Raines said. ''Even though it's a big room, there are no echoes. And the light is not harsh. It's easy on your eyes to limit distractions.''
Damage assessment
Strah said the job of restoring power begins with an assessment of the damage.
''Then, when it's safe — our biggest priority is safety for the public and our employees — we begin clearing electrical hazards and get an understanding of the damage,'' he said. ''The largest challenge in a storm of this nature are downed trees.''
Strah said Ohio Edison prioritizes restoration of power, beginning with emergency services, such as police, fire and hospitals.
Then it will work on areas affecting the most customers. The line crews start with transmission lines that can serve up to 3,000 customers, then go to substations and work their way down to single customers.
''We are working around the clock — line crews work 16 hours, then rest eight,'' Strah said.
FirstEnergy has contracted with 12 Giant Eagle and Buehler's grocery stores in Summit, Stark, Medina and Portage counties to provide free water and ice to customers who lost power.
Bill Lilley can be reached at 330-996-3811 or blilley@thebeaconjournal.com.
Beacon Journal staff writer Katie Byard and the Associated Press contributed to this article.
An ardent Steelers hater, Steve Strah was geared up to spend Sunday night in front of a large-screen TV watching the Cleveland-Pittsburgh extravaganza.
Get the full article here.
Comments
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Posted 01:39 AM, 09/16/2008
Hey Steve, Nice Job, I got two words for you HA HA, 10-0, 5 Rings, choke on that!
Posted 11:25 AM, 09/16/2008
Why don't you choke.
