WPCNR THE POWER NEWS. Based on information from Con Edison Media Relations. March 15, 2010: Based on a news release from Con Edison at 8 P.M Monday evening, the company reports it is restoring all of New York city outages before finishing off Westchester County restoration, even though Westchester County as of 11 P.M. has 56,538 customers out and all of New York city as of 8 P.M. has only 14,820 customers without power. Con Edison restored approximately 11,000 customers since 12 noon Monday when 67,000 in the county were without power.
At 11 P.M., 56,538 Westchester County customers are without power, with Yonkers,Greenburg, White Plains Scarsdale and Mount Vernon leading the number of outages: Yonkers has 14,095 out (up 2,000 since 12 noon Monday), Greenburgh, 8,012 of 18,702 residents, down less than 1,000 since noon; Mount Vernon,6,966, New Rochelle, 7,608 (25% of Con Ed customers there); and White Plains,5,667. Scarsdale according to Con Edison has 80% of Con Ed customers without power, 4,728 of 6,005.
Elsewhere around Westchester County, Tuckahoe has 1,246 out; Tarrytown, 1,429; Rye City, 2,051 (33%); Port Chester, 1068; North Castle, 1,694; Mount Pleasant (County Executive Astorino's hometown), 1,212;Larchmont/Mamaroneck, 2,605; Irvington, 2,066; Hastings, 646; Harrison, 2,848; Eastchester, 3,125; Dobbs Ferry, 543;Briarcliff, 555; Ardsley, 774.
Con Edison has approximately 500 restoration crews now in the fieldas of 8 P.M. Monday , in addition to other field support personnel clearing roads and trees. The number of restoration crews is expected to grow to 675 by Wednesday as additional out-of-state crews arrive.
The company expects to have all storm-related outages in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx restored by Wednesday afternoon, followed by Staten Island on Thursday evening, and Westchester on Friday, it said tonight.
With the ground softened by a huge snowstorm two weeks ago, an ugly mix of over four inches of rain and winds of up to 70 m.p.h. combined to knock trees over like matchsticks over the weekend, felling power lines and complicating clearance efforts, especially in Westchester County and Staten Island.
Over 173,000 lost power, easily eclipsing the outages caused by Hurricane Gloria in 1985, which affected 110,515 customers.
As of 8 p.m. tonight, the company had restored power to over 100,000 customers. Approximately 70,000 customers remained without power: 55,000 in Westchester County, 9,000 in Staten Island, 3,700 in the Bronx, 1,470 in Queens and 650 in Brooklyn.
Con Edison distributed 31,500 pounds of dry ice at four different locations today, and will resume distribution tomorrow (Tuesday) from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Con Edison has additional customer service representatives, electrical and construction crews, along with tree-clearing crews working around the clock to respond to customers and power outages that may occur.
Customers are urged to call Con Edison immediately to report any outages at 1-800-75-CONED (1-800-752-6633). Customers can also report power interruptions or service problems at www.conEd.com and on their cell phones and PDAs. When reporting an outage, customers should have their Con Edison account number available, if possible, and report whether their neighbors also have lost power.
Customers who have already reported their outage need not call Con Edison again. They will be called by Con Edison when their estimated restoration time has been established.
During the restoration process, primary distribution feeders are restored first, with the highest priority given to restoring lines that supply the most customers. Next, the crews fix secondary facilities, such as transformers and secondary cables, again with highest priority given to lines supplying the greatest number of customers. Individual services, lines serving a single home, will be restored as crews become available.
