NOVEC crews push to restore power to nine customers

As of 5 p.m. on Thursday, March 7, Northern Virginia Electric Cooperative crews were working to restore power to nine customers in Fairfax, Loudoun, Prince William, and Stafford counties, according to a news release.

“We’re giving it a final push to get everyone back online tonight,”  Larry Shaffer, vice president for System Operations was quoted as saying in the news release. “Our crews have been amazing: they’ve traveled over icy roads, cut trees off power lines, restrung fallen lines, replaced nine broken poles, and got the lights back on for more than 8,000 customers in just a day and a half. Our guys’ determination, along with their stamina, has made the difference.”

The March 6, 2013, snowstorm caused 8,165 NOVEC customers to lose electricity when snow-ladened trees and branches fell on power lines and broke utility poles, according to NOVEC and contract crews have worked non-stop to get the power back on for these customers since the first outage report came in at 2 a.m. on Wednesday. 
 
Mike Curtis, vice president, Public Relations, says, “We appreciate our Co-op members’ patience. We understand that no one wants to be without electricity, especially on cold winter days and nights. Our employees thank everyone for their kind words and encouragement.”

To follow NOVEC’s progress, go to its outage map at http://stormcenter.novec.com/index.cfm For g.eneral information about power outages, go to http://www.novec.com/Customer_Services/Outage_Information/index.cfm.