Duquesne Light: Sunday's Wind Storm One Of The Worst In 20 Years
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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Duquesne Light says Sunday's wind storm was one of the worst they've seen in the past 20 years.
The company says since Sunday morning, the high winds have caused service interruptions to more than 125,000 customers across Allegheny and Beaver counties.
According to Duquesne Light, the wind storm damage ranks among the top three worst in the last 20 years.
Power has been restored to more than 92,000 customers. About 31,000 customers still don't have service as of 6:30 p.m. Monday.
The majority of customers should have service restored by late Wednesday night.
The relentless wind found the most vulnerable trees and turned them into electric line assassins. Through the long weekend and into Monday, Duquesne Light's Jamie Stack says the attack hasn't stopped.
"As we continue to see outages, trees limbs, trees still coming down," Stack said.
The outages forced a lot of schools to delay the start of the day, and the schools without power to close all together.
For thousands of homes and businesses, it's been a powerless couple of days.
"Some of our eastern districts are hit pretty hard. The Penn Hills area was hit pretty badly, as well as some of the North Hills area," Stack said.
Disappointed customers arrived at the Ross Township Sheetz to find handwritten closed signs on the doors and the gas pumps taped off. Sheetz brought in generators to preserve what it could at several of its stores that lost power.
They weren't so lucky at Trader Joe's in East Liberty where the power went out Sunday afternoon and the clock started ticking on the perishables. Ten pallets of food went to the local food bank, but that's all their coolers and freezers could hold. The rest was being thrown out Monday by the store's employees.
"I feel good that they are transparent and honest about it. That they are not selling stuff that might have been affected," customer Sayan Dey, of Frick Park, said.
The power is back on, the store open, and a fresh supply of food has arrived, but they estimate it will take a couple days to replenish everything.
At its peak, just over a quarter of a million Duquesne Light and West Penn Power customers lost their electricity.
As of 9:30 p.m. on Monday, approximately 30,000 Duquesne Light customers remained without service.
West Penn Power, meanwhile, says it's too early to estimate when the power will be restored. A little more than 29,000 West Penn Power customers in the KDKA viewing area were without service as of 9:40 p.m. on Monday.
The Red Cross is working with communities to open a number of warming stations across the region for residents without power. They are listed below.
Allegheny County:
- Allegheny Alliance Church at 250 East Ohio Street
- East McKeesport: at the United Volunteer Fire/Rescue Station 135 at 600 Broadway Avenue
- Penn Hills at Penn Hills Station 227, which is at 125 Universal Road
- West Homestead at the West Homestead Fire Department Station 292 located at 447 W. 8th Avenue
Beaver County:
- Holy Family Social Hall at 1851 Third Avenue, New Brighton
Erie County:
- West Ridge Fire Company in Millcreek
- Fairfield Fire Company at 4896 East Lake Road, Harborcreek