Kentucky Power Ice Storm Response: Thursday, February 11, 10 a.m.

Kentucky Power Ice Storm Response

Thursday, February 11, 10 a.m.

Summary

Severe wintry weather has been making its way through Kentucky Power’s territory, bringing with it freezing rain and snow. Nearly 24,000 customers in Boyd, Carter, Greenup, Lawrence and Rowan counties are without power as a result.

This weather front is expected to continue for several more hours and be through the area by late this afternoon, likely leaving behind additional customers without power, poor road conditions and on-going chilly temperatures. Additional winter storms are in the near-term weather forecast.

Outages

The current outage situation:

Boyd County                      10,328 customers

Carter County                      4,735 customers

Greenup                                3,061 customers

Lawrence                              3,396 customers

Rowan County                     1,099 customers

Storm Response Efforts

Hazardous road conditions will slow the restoration process in these early hours.  Crews are conducting damage assessment, responding to hazardous situations and working to restore essential services as the first step. Until further damage assessment can take place, estimated restoration times are not available. Complete restoration is expected to be a multi-day effort.

Several large transmission lines are out of service this morning, causing large clusters of customers to be without power. Further, more than 240 individual outage cases have to be assessed and repaired.

Local emergency authorities are reporting several road closures due to trees and icy conditions and discourage travel unless absolutely necessary. Ice remains the biggest threat at this time which causes significant damage to Kentucky Power electrical facilities.

Resources

As of this morning, nearly 800 personnel are in the area.  Crews from Kentucky Power, AEP sister companies and business partners make up the response team and were brought to staging areas to be ready to respond as quickly as possible. Additional crews will be in place later today and tomorrow. Once the storm passes through Kentucky Power’s territory, crews not needed in some areas will shift to assist those areas that are in need of help.

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 visit www.kentuckypower.com/alerts. Information also is posted on Facebook at https://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.

Boyd County has opened the Community Center (15650 KY-180, Catlettsburg) and Boyd County Road Department (12327 Anthony Drive, Ashland) for warming stations and emergency shelter for the general public.