Linemen worked long hours to restore power in Hillsdale. Courtesy | Facebook
The Hillsdale Board of Public Utilities has restored power to most of its customers, as residents across Hillsdale County and the state have been facing a power outage since the night of Feb. 22.
The city estimates the power restoration effort cost about $500,000, according to City Councilman Joshua Paladino ’18. A draft document showed the outage reached more than 90% of county residents.
The BPU had restored power to all but a handful of its customers by Sunday, according to a Facebook post. The agency asked customers still without power to call 517-437-6431 so crews could restore their energy.
“If there are any BPU customers who are still without power and did not call our special outage number yesterday, please do so as soon as possible,” the post said. “It worked extremely well, and allowed us to efficiently dispatch crews to customers.”
Hundreds of Consumers Energy customers, however, are still without power across the county, according to the energy company. The company has assigned crews to most affected areas and predicted it would restore power to these remaining customers soon.
The college canceled classes on Thursday and Friday due to the outage. The campus went mostly without power Thursday, according to an email from Vice President for Student Affairs Diane Philipp. Most buildings on campus had power by Thursday evening, Philipp said, but the library and main classroom buildings did not.
The outage came the same day cellular providers had restored service that went out Tuesday. The college lost power around 5:40 p.m. on Feb. 22, and according to the Detroit Free Press, the outage hit more than 700,000 homes and businesses across the state.
According to the Michigan State Police, the ice storm caused the worst outages in Hillsdale, Oakland, Macomb, and Jackson counties.
“We have quite a few customers that are out at the moment,” said City of Hillsdale Marketing and Development Coordinator Sam Fry on the night of the blackout. “It’s not just us, everyone is bearing the brunt of this weather.”
Fry said the ice storm caused issues with power lines, which tripped a breaker at the power source. He said every BPU employee has been working to resolve the outage.
“We do ask folks for patience and understanding while our guys work out there in some pretty tough conditions,” Fry said. “But folks should know they’re doing everything in their power to get our grid back up as soon as they can.”
BPU trucks and firefighters responded to downed limbs and transformers across the city on the night of the storm. When a transformer exploded at the intersection of Union Street and Barber Drive around 8:45 p.m., students in Benzing Residence evacuated as firefighters and BPU workers responded. Firefighters also responded to falling trees and limbs on Barber Drive near Hayden Park.
Around 10 p.m., flares surrounded a darkened City Hall so drivers would not hit the building. Most stop lights and street lights went dark. Linemen experienced so many hazards that at 12 a.m., they had to postpone repairs until daylight, according to a press release from the city.
“We ask that residents please stay off of the streets for their own safety,” BPU Director David Mackie said in a press release.
Fry said he is grateful no workers have been injured so far.
“I think it’s also a testament to our guys and the training they go through,” he said.
Nearly 75% of transmission lines to the city were offline as of 7 a.m. Thursday morning, a press release said. The BPU restored power to nearly 40% of its more than 6,000 customers by Thursday evening around 5 p.m., and continued repairs through the night.
The BPU had restored power to nearly 50% of customers by Friday morning, Fry said, and officials hoped to restore power to 80% of their customers by the end of the day.
“We’d certainly like to get more people back on line, and we’re hopeful that we will, but that’s our best estimate,” Fry said. “Linemen are extremely selfless. A lot of them have been working back-to-back 16-hour days now, and they might not have power themselves at home.”
The communities of Grand Haven, Zeeland, Bryan, Lowell, and Napoleon sent resources to help the city recover, according to Fry. He said the crews stayed overnight Thursday, and Coldwater, Sturgis, and Bowling Green, Ohio, sent more crews Friday.
Verizon and AT&T restored cell service Feb. 22, the same day the ice storm caused the outage, after an outage across the Hillsdale area that started Feb. 21. Those with AT&T found their service had returned by morning, and those with Verizon found their service returned later that day.
“Service was restored overnight for wireless and home phone customers in the Hillsdale area following an equipment failure,” an AT&T spokesperson said. “We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate the patience of our customers.”
Freshman Elanor Balsbaugh said she had Cricket, and since she had a Samsung, she had been having issues contacting people with iPhones.
“My sister has an iPhone and I have Samsung, so I couldn’t text her, though it came back on today,” she said on Feb. 22. “She went to her house, and I was going to a church thing with her and couldn’t communicate.”
Freshman Autumn Visser said she has Verizon and used alternative ways to communicate with friends.
“It didn’t really affect any plans that I had, because we had Discord so we were able to kind of chat,” she said. “I couldn’t talk to my parents, which is kind of an issue because we texted frequently, but we had Marco Polo so that was fine.”
Visser said she lost service around noon Feb. 21, and her service returned around 9:30 or 10 p.m. Freshman Helen Rogers, however, said she didn’t find herself with service until noon the next day.
Sophomore Jason Lu, Junior Micah Miller and Senior Dan Harmon said they had service from T-Mobile and never lost reception.
The Collegian has updated this article since its power returned.
