September 10, 2008

FKEC RESTORES ALL POWER & REOPENS AFTER HURRICANE IKE

Florida Keys Electric Cooperative's offices in Tavernier and Marathon reopened for normal business after Hurricane Ike on Wednesday, September 10, at 8 a.m. Offices were closed due to the mandatory evacuation on Monday and Tuesday.

FKEC crews began restoring scattered power outages on Monday, September 8, and continued to restore power throughout the hurricane's brush through FKEC's service territory in the Upper and Middle Florida Keys from North Key Largo to Marathon.

The two most significant outages during Hurricane Ike resulted from tornadoes.

TORNADO IN KEY LARGO

The first tornado affected about 100 consumer accounts in Sexton Cove on the bayside at mile marker 106 on Tuesday morning, September 9. The tornado knocked down one span of primary wire which was quickly repaired by FKEC crews. The tornado also caused a 2' x 4' piece of wood to pierce the side of a home in Sexton Cove.

TORNADO IN ISLAMORADA

The second tornado occurred at 3:45 a.m. Wednesday morning, September 10. At that time, a tornado or water spout came ashore on the oceanside right at mile marker 74, crossed U.S. Highway 1 and entered the Safety Harbor neighborhood.

As it came ashore, the tornado shredded trees on the oceanside of the highway and threw palm fronds into the transmission lines. This caused the main transmission system to relay out in Tavernier. As a result, all electricity went out from Snake Creek at mile marker 86 down to Key West.

Once FKEC crews found the palm fronds and cleared them from the main transmission lines, the system was reenergized at approximately 5:47 a.m.

FKEC also had numerous spans of primary, secondary and neutral lines down in Safety Harbor and in the Sunset Drive neighborhood on the oceanside of U.S. 1 at mile marker 74. Crews repaired all downed lines and reenergized Safety Harbor by approximately 8:20 a.m.

OTHER SCATTERED OUTAGES

Other outages occurred starting on Monday night, September 8, through Wednesday morning. One local outage at 11:22 p.m. Monday was caused by a palm tree by Lazy Days restaurant. This outage affected 165 consumers and power was restored by FKEC crews at 12:22 a.m.

On Tuesday morning, September 9, a broken insulator caused an outage on Key Colony Beach affecting 543 consumers. Power was restored at 8:48 a.m.