The Daily Record
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Duke customers spend two evenings in the dark. Planned third outage coming up.
By LISA FARMER and KEILAH GOFF
Of The Record Staff
Those Dunn and Plain View residents served by Duke Energy had a hot and hectic weekend as power was off both Saturday and Sunday.
The good news is power has been restored. However, there will be another outage. But this time it will be planned and the community notified, according to Marty Clayton, district manager of government and community relations.
The cause of the problem, which caused a more than eighthour outage Saturday evening and another two-and-a-half-hour outage Sunday night, was a transformer in Dunn that went bad. The high customer use and the heat were too much. At one point, Dunn Emergency Services had firefighters spraying water on the transformer to cool it down.
Now there is a mobile substation that was brought in on a flatbed truck in place. The outage Sunday was in order to switch over to the mobile substation.
At the height of the outage, almost 7,700 Duke customers were without power Saturday.
“We had no warning as far as Saturday night was concerned. Our main priority was to get the hospital up and running,” Mr. Clayton said.
Kevin Jackson, president of Harnett Health, said Betsy Johnson Hospital’s electricity was restored in about two hours.
Along the way, as many customers as possible were switched to other feeders, so during Sunday’s outage approximately 4,500 customers were without power, Mr. Clayton said.
He said when the permanent substation is installed, it will be planned carefully to provide the least disruption to customers. It will probably take two to three hours and it won’t happen until See Outages, Page 3 Outages
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likely the fall.
He said customers should not be concerned, the mobile substation is handling the load.
The Daily Record was not able to reach anyone from Duke Energy Sunday before presstime and Mr. Clayton apologized for that.
Traffic
Meanwhile, the streets in Dunn were a mess with the traffic lights not working. Drivers did not know how to navigate through intersections.
According to Dunn Police Capt. Johnny Royal, there were no reported traffic accidents during the power outages.
Capt. Royal said he brought in five extra officers Saturday and Sunday evenings to help patrol the darkened neighborhoods and set out temporary stop signs at the major intersections.
“The weekend was uneventful,” he said. “Everything went by real smooth.”
Officers did observe some drivers did not seem to understand that all intersections are treated as four-way stops when traffic lights are not functioning. Luckily, there were no collisions.
“The only accident I am aware of happened after the lights came back on, Sunday,” said Capt. Royal.
In spite of the dangerously extreme heat index values, leading the National Weather Service to issue a head advisory for the entire central region of the state, no heat-related illnesses were reported to Dunn Emergency Services, even throughout the periods when power was not available.
One small house fire was reported on Cashwell Street Saturday night after a candle was reportedly knocked over by the family’s dog. Dunn firefighters were able to contain the damage to one room of the house.
Restaurants
Restaurants across the city took a financial hit as they lost power at the height of the weekend dinner hours.
At the Sagebrush Steakhouse, Saturday’s outage took the staff and diners by surprise.
“It was a hot mess!” said service manager Rhonda Rios.
She said after the power went off Saturday evening, she contacted officials to find out when it would be restored. Following their initial estimate of a two-hour outage, she kept on a skeleton crew in hopes of reopening. After the two hours passed, she was told it would not be restored until after midnight, and she was forced to close for the night.
“We had to get people out of the restaurant,” she said, adding that they had several large parties and a bake sale in process for the girls 10-and-under state champions from Dunn. “We had a lot going on.”
Sunday’s outage came with advanced notice, which allowed her to plan around the loss of power.
“We closed the door at 6 so we could get everyone fed and out the door,” said Ms. Rios. “We were glad we had some warning.”
She said the estimated revenue losses for the weekend totaled around $8,000.
“We know they did what they had to do,” added Ms. Rios. “Hopefully, it is all fixed, now.”
Dunn’s loss may have been Benson’s gain, as travelers and residents without power migrated north for dinner in air-conditioned comfort. Benson restaurateurs noticed the increased traffic.
“Oh, definitely,” said Elaine Massengill, manager of the Char-Grill in Benson. “We were extremely busy. It was great for us, but we hated it for the Dunn community.”
Ms. Massengill said she had a similar experience a few weeks ago when a heavy electrical storm knocked out the power in Benson for several hours.
“I know how devastating it is for the restaurant business,” she said.
