High Winds Knock Out Power To Thousands
High winds blowing across southeast Michigan are to blame for at least 40,000 Metro Detroit power outages Wednesday -- most of those blackouts in Oakland County.
Meantime, 160,000 outages were reported by Consumers Energy on the west side of the state.
DTE Energy crews were working to restore power, but companyofficials say its hard to know how long it will take, DTE Spokesman Len Singersaid they hope to have most customers up and running sometime Wednesday night.
"We do have a lot of crews in here that are from other areas of the state, contract crews that work with us throughout the year, and then some other contract crews we've brought in from the west side of the state. So, we really do have a lot of people out there working on the restoration effort," said Singer.
Singer tells WWJ that most of the outages occurred, as usual, in more heavily treed areas.
"Down trees are using the culprit of downing power lines. And, typically when we get into area where there are heavily treed neighborhoods, that's where we'll start to see a lot of the problems when we have wind storms of this nature," Singer said.
Wind gusts of up to 46 miles per hour were reported Wednesday at Metro Airport. Some flights were delayed. Check the status of your flight at this link.
A high wind advisory ended at 8 p.m.
Even higher wind gusts were reported in northern Michigan. A gust of 74 mph was reported near Traverse City late Wednesday morning. In Gogebic County, in the Upper Peninsula, a temporary shelter was set up at a community college in Ironwood because of widespread power outages.
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