Kentucky Power Ice Storm Response
Friday, February 12, 10 a.m.
Summary
An ice storm moved through eastern Kentucky wreaking havoc on electrical facilities, causing power outages for thousands of Kentucky Power customers. Outages peaked late Thursday morning with nearly 25,000 customers out of power. Customers in Boyd, Carter, Greenup, Lawrence and Rowan counties are mostly affected.
Outages
Late last night, new outages occurred in parts of Kentucky Power’s service territory leaving an additional 970 customers without power this morning.
From the storm that went through late Wednesday night to Thursday morning, more than 20,000 customers remain without power.
The current outage situation:
Boyd County 8,850 customers
Carter County 4,052 customers
Greenup County 2,200 customers
Lawrence County 2,977 customers
Letcher County 217 customers
Lewis County 265 customers
Knott 190 customers
Perry County 281 customers
Pike County 219 customers
Rowan County 1,099 customers
Storm Response Efforts
Crews spent the first full day of restoration on Thursday addressing hazardous situations which included cutting trees and clearing access. Crews also conducted outage assessments which uncovered wide-ranging damage such as numerous broken poles and downed spans of wire. The transmission team worked on making repairs to large voltage lines and substations. Helicopters were used for damage assessment as well. Even though, most of the day was spent on damage assessment, nearly 5,000 customers were restored by the end of the day.
With hundreds of additional personnel relocated to the counties in and around Ashland, restoration should go well. However, there are more than 495 individual outage cases that have to be addressed.
While many customers will be restored over the next day or so, complete restoration is expected to continue through the weekend with 95% restored by Monday evening.
Crews from Kentucky Power, company business partners and AEP sister companies from Indiana, and Ohio are assisting with restoration.
For More Information
Customers can report outages and check the latest restoration information for their account anytime at kentuckypower.com/outages or by downloading the Kentucky Power mobile app at kentuckypower.com/app. The outage map is updated every 15 minutes. Restoration information is added when known. Click on “View Outage Map” to access the map on a computer, cell phone, or tablet. Customers can report outages online, on their mobile device or to our Customer Operations Center at 1-800-572-1113.
Customers also can get specific information about outages via text message and/or email by subscribing to Kentucky Power outage alerts. To sign up, please visitwww.kentuckypower.com/alerts. Information also is posted on Facebook athttps://www.facebook.com/KentuckyPower and on Twitter at twitter.com/KentuckyPower or @KentuckyPower.
Safety Message
Stay away from all downed lines or sparking equipment, and keep children and pets away from fallen lines and anything the lines may touch.
For everyone’s health and safety with the ongoing Covid-19 crisis, please do not approach power company personnel in the field.
Next Update:
Friday, February 12, 6:30 p.m.
