High winds cut power to record number in Michigan

[inanna]

Source: Detroit Free Press

8:21 p.m. ET March 8, 2017

First high winds, then a loss of power, and soon ... deepening cold.

That's the fate facing an estimated million-plus Michiganders. They now must expect to survive as long as this weekend, as temperatures begin to plunge into the teens, before everyone can get back on the grid with heat and light, according to Michigan's two utility giants — Detroit-based DTE Energy and Jackson-based Consumers Energy.

A barrage of high winds Wednesday cut power to a near-record 630,000 DTE Energy customers and at least 222,000 customers of Consumers Energy across southeast and south-central Michigan, utility officials said.

The total number of customers, 852,000, equates to an even higher number of people because the utilities' term "customer" refers to electric meters, not individuals. It was the second-highest number of outages in DTE Energy history, and one of the highest for Jackson-based Consumers Energy, officials said.

“During the height of the storm, we were seeing 1,000 customer outages a minute,” said Randi Berris, a communications manager for DTE Energy.

Read more: http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2017/03/08/high-winds-cut-power-record-number-michigan/98927500/

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I'm not far from Detroit and we're getting hit with this too. But so far, the lights are still on here.

Stay safe, people.

[Kaleva]

1. I live in the western part of Upper Michigan and we have high winds here too

A few places have lost power temporarily but just an occasional flickering of lights for me so far.

[inanna]

2. Glad to hear you are okay.

I have to walk my dogs soon!

[susanna]

3. Downriver Michigan here - I am still on

but lots of small pockets out everywhere around here. It appears to be the luck of the draw.

Still blowing out, but nothing like earlier today - our roof on a large brick three-story home was groaning under the onslaught. Unsettling to say the least!

Agree with inanna - stay safe and beware of downed trees and power lines!

[democratisphere]

4. High winds in upstate New York too!

Watched a tractor trailer get blown over on its side and a large evergreen snap at the base of the trunk. Wires are down everywhere and many schools are closed tomorrow (Thursday). Glad there is no such thing as climate change.

[inanna]

8. Yep. Utility trailer blown over on Ambassador Bridge

between Windsor and Detroit as well.

Crazy!

[salin]

5. Blankets, layers of clothes, stay warm.

Be safe.

[putitinD]

6. Macomb county here, windy as heck, power still on though!

[littlemissmartypants]

7. Link to world wind map follows. ..

https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-84.31,29.12,216

Sample images. Not current data. (No pun intended.)





More here

https://earth.nullschool.net/about.html

[woundedkarma]

9. in michigan

Basically we're in the middle of the line from ann arbor to lansing.

We had high winds and gusts since yesterday. Then the power went out for a couple hours today. The only other issue was our fence got blown so much we're going to have to do some repairs... the goats and chickens were escaping

I'm surprised others are still without power.. our company (not dte) usually gets things going pretty fast.

[EarthFirst]

10. Same situation in Western New York as well...

We've been without service since 1 p.m. Wednesday.

309 utility poles went down in our county alone yesterday. Over 100K in just the metro Rochester and surrounding suburbs without service.

They're saying midnight or early Friday morning before service can be restored to our home. Some areas it will be as late as Saturday or Sunday before being restored.

Yesterday was a bad weather day.

Good luck Michigan, we're in the same boat!

[riversedge]

11. Our huge pine tree in the yard blew down. Whow-hit the line to the house-tore it off, what

a mess-tore siding off. No one hurt but I will miss that beautiful pine.

[inanna]

13. I'm so glad no one was hurt!

[Buckeyeblue]

12. South of Kalamazoo

We are fortunate and the power stayed on. Many in kalamazoo are without. The wind was just brutal, yet the sky was clear and sunny. Strange day.

[dembotoz]

14. Wisconsin went thru that yesterday

Some still without power

[Vinca]

15. I'm in NH and we're currently experiencing high winds.

Fortunately, we have a generator as back-up. There's nothing scarier than losing power when it's frigid.

[Hortensis]

16. DTE company alone has updated info to 670K without

power in its part of Michigan. I read that many schools have been closed, meaning that parents can't drop their kids off and head for heated (when available) workplaces.

I sure hope most homes in the northern states have some kind of alternative heating. It can get very cold for brief periods in north Georgia, and lengthy power outages have resulted in large-scale evacuations from unsustainable homes, like whole newer subdivisions.

No doubt heroic line and pole crews from all over the nation are coming to the rescue. A real advantage to being a large country with different climates.

Oh, by the way, not-President Clinton hoped to have almost 1/2 billion solar panels on our homes and businesses by the end of her first term. Most homeowners would have used them in conjunction with power-sharing agreements with power companies, of course.

In some red states, state government seizures of homeowner property rights mean all power produced on their properties already belongs to their energy companies period, no sharing, but angry homeowners will no doubt someday get those laws repealed. Some decade now.