Florida Keys Electric Cooperative had in excess of 4,000 member-consumers
out of service during the height of Hurricane Rita's brush by the Keys.
There were scattered outages throughout the Upper and Middle Keys during the
storm and one area-wide outage affecting approximately 3,900 consumers on
Duck Key, Grassy Key and Key Colony Beach.
The Middle Keys outage was caused by faults on two main distribution lines
served by the Crawl Key Substation. The two lines serve from mile marker
53.4 to mile marker 65.6. Both circuits were out at 10:30 a.m., but by 1:30
p.m. the line serving approximately 1,800 in Key Colony Beach was restored.
The remaining 2,100 consumers were restored by 5:30 p.m.
The remaining scattered outages throughout the Upper and Middle Keys were
restored by Tuesday evening. FKEC crews began working on repairs from the
ground as soon as conditions allowed, but bucket trucks could not be safely
operated until winds dropped below tropical storm force.
FKEC answered an additional 50 calls for service today as evacuated
residents returned to their homes.
The co-op again staffed a live call center to answer and log outage reports.
The outage reporting number is 852-2431 in Tavernier and 743-5344 in
Marathon. These numbers provide access to either FKEC's automated outage
reporting system or to a live volunteer, when available.
Tree limbs touching or falling on power lines cause 85% of all power
outages, which is why FKEC encourages home and business owners to look up
before installing landscaping and to keep existing trees trimmed safely away
from overhead lines.
