BLUEBONNET ELECTRIC WORKING ON AREA POWER OUTAGES

  

Tropical Storm Bill ripped through Bluebonnet’s service area Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, bringing strong winds that toppled trees into power lines and heavy rain that caused local flooding. Most of the outages were concentrated in Burleson, Fayette and Washington counties.

At 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, Bluebonnet reported 72 individual power outages, affecting 978 members. In the Brenham area, which includes all Washington, Burleson and Fayette counties, Bluebonnet reported 50 outages, affecting about 450 members.

“We were prepared for the storm and had our crews and contractors ready to restore power as quickly and safely as possible,” said Matt Bentke, Bluebonnet’s deputy general manager. “With all the rain we had last month and what Tropical Storm Bill brought overnight, we are unable to use our trucks and other equipment in many areas.  Our crews are having to carry tools and equipment and climb poles to replace damaged equipment. This slows us down, but doesn’t stop us from getting the job done.”

Three large outages – two in Burleson County and one if Fayette County – affecting about 2,000 Bluebonnet members were caused by high winds and trees damaging power poles and breaking power lines. Bluebonnet crews and tree-trimming contractors restored power to the Burleson County outages Wednesday morning. Crews in Fayette County were hampered by a rain-swollen creek, but were able to begin removing a fallen tree and repair downed power lines at 9:30 a.m. About 50 smaller outages were spread throughout Washington County.

“We have 100 men and women working to restore power today, and have about 70 available this evening to finish restoring power,” Bentke said. “We expect to have power fully restored sometime tonight. We’ve had very positive feedback from our members during these outages. We greatly appreciate everyone’s patience and understanding while we work as quickly and safely to get their power back on.”