by Marianne Christy
A fire from a failed pole insulator caused a power outage along the Route 28 corridor from Alder Creek to Raquette Lake on Tuesday, January 26, according Virginia Limmiatis, a spokesperson for National Grid.
The outage, which effected approximately 5,800 customers, occurred at approximately noon with power fully restored to the area by 7:30 p.m.
It marked the second time in seven weeks that the area suffered a significant outage due to equipment failure.
A December 9 pole fire in Thendara left customers from Old Forge to Raquette Lake without service for a seven-hour period.
Another outage that occurred on January 10 that left residents without service for anywhere from five to 17 hours was due to wind and severe weather, as well as a motor vehicle accident.
Limmiatis said in cases such as extreme weather or accidents, outages cannot be prevented.
“But obviously every concern is important to us to hear and act on. Our number one goal is still safety and customer service. That is unchanged,” she said.
In terms of equipment, she said National Grid’s goal is to survey the entire Central New York service area and identify improvements that need to be made.
“The situations that occurred with these outages is truly due to equipment in the area. It happens across the footprint of our service area and when detected they are addressed.
“Old Forge is one of our stakeholders and we look for improvements on reliability and infrastructure improvements… but it’s something not particular to the Old Forge area. We continue to identify areas that need to have equipment, perhaps, changed out. And so it’s part of our whole strategic plan to identify areas that need an overhaul of improvement of services,” she said.
