Electric Co-op Today

As a massive winter storm of hurricane strength tore through Alaska on Wednesday, electric cooperative workers there were standing by ready to respond to outages once they can travel safely.

Children play in sea foam of Nome harbor Nov. 8, as the big Bering Sea storm churns along the western coastline of Alaska. (Photo By: Associated Press/Peggy Fagerstrom)

Some meteorologists were comparing the massive weather system to an “arctic hurricane,” and residents of many areas well away from the coast were being urged to stay inside until conditions improved.

“This will be an extremely dangerous and life-threatening storm of an epic magnitude rarely experienced,” wrote National Weather Service meteorologists in an advisory issued Nov. 8.

“It’s so big. It covers 750 to 1,000 miles, almost, in breadth,” Jeff Osiensky, a regional warning coordination meteorologist, told reporters. “These things get named hurricanes down south and get a category.”

Sustained winds of 50 mph to 75 mph with gusts of 90 mph to 100 mph were being reported in some areas several hours after the leading edge made landfall.

“You can’t drive to the area being impacted,” Marilyn Leland, executive director of the Alaska Power Association, told ECT.coop, Nov. 9, one day after the storm began buffeting the coastline.

“Larger towns like Kotzebue and Nome are served by Alaska Airlines, but even they don’t fly in the worst weather,” Leland said. “This time of year, you can only get to places like Kivalina and Savoonga by small plane and they are definitely not flying now.”

Evacuation centers were opened in most of the communities served by Alaska Village Electric Cooperative. Residents were urged to move to higher ground, as hundreds of homes were threatened by unprecedented high water levels.

“The vast majority of our 54 villages are in the path of the storm,” said Meera Kohler, president and CEO of Anchorage-based AVEC. “Our entire staff of traveling technicians is in the field. It is impossible to move people between locations until the worst has passed.”

Winds topping 60 mph began buffeting the village of Kotzebue just before midnight Nov. 9, and were not expected to subside until late the following evening.

“We’ve had some metal roofs blown off, but no outages yet,” said Brad Reeve, general manager of Kotzebue Electric Association.

The co-op website reported temperatures down to 10 degrees with visibility down to 100 feet due to heavy snow and freezing fog early Nov. 9.

“Residents of this area are used to cyclonic storms but we haven’t seen one of this intensity in many years,” Reeve said. “Schools and businesses are closed, but the electric co-op is open.”

Tags: Lineworkers, Power Outages, Preparedness