Winter Storm Causes EMC Outages

Latest update from Georgia EMC:

Tucker, Ga. – At 3 p.m., Georgia’s electric membership cooperatives (EMCs) are reporting approximately 149,000 customers without power, up from 96,000 this morning.

While line crews have restored service to thousands of customers since yesterday, a second band of winter weather arrived overnight and in the pre-dawn hours and caused thousands of new outages.

This storm produced as much as 10 inches of snow in some areas and caused heavy damage in Cobb, Carroll, Cherokee, Douglas, Paulding and Union Counties. Other affected counties include Bartow, Douglas, Forsyth, Fulton, Gilmer, Lumpkin, Habersham, Hall, Haralson, Pickens, Rabun, Towns and White Counties.

The weight of snow in particular in these areas has been a challenge as it causes trees to snap or lean into the right of way, bringing down lines or causing them to touch. Repairs have been time-intensive since outages are widespread and in some cases located in every corner of an EMC’s service area.

To assist in the rate of restoration, nearly 300 additional linemen and 50 right-of-way crews from Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee and Florida have descended upon the affected areas. They will work until all power is restored.

Georgia EMC is the statewide trade association representing the state’s 41 EMCs, Oglethorpe Power Corp., Georgia Transmission Corp. and Georgia System Operations Corp. Collectively, Georgia’s customer-owned EMCs provide electricity and related services to 4.4 million people, nearly half of Georgia’s population, across 73 percent of the state’s land area.

Posted on December 9, 2017

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