General

OPPD team facing damage, terrain like ‘something we’ve never seen’

Hurricane Helene cut a swath of devastating damage across the southeast after making landfall in Florida on Thursday, September 26. It left nearly 4 million electric customers in the dark.

With the massive power restoration effort facing them, utilities there put out calls for help, including to the Midwest Mutual Aid Group. Omaha Public Power District answered the call.

“Our employees were eager to help. Some of the line technicians called me earlier in the week, asking when and where we were going,” said Eli Schiessler, OPPD Transmission & Distribution center manager.

The district joined several other utilities from Nebraska that headed south in advance of the storm to pre-stage for restoration work. OPPD deployed a crew of 16 workers who hit the road early on Saturday for Beckley, West Virginia, about an hour outside of Charleston. They arrived in Beckley the next evening and started work Monday morning. The team is working to restore service to customers of Appalachian Power.

The team consists of four three-person line crews, a member of OPPD’s safety team and two transportation mechanics, headed by crew supervisor Ernie Ross.

“The damage here and the terrain we’re dealing with, it’s something we’ve never seen,” said Ross.

This is his third mutual aid deployment. He was among the OPPD crews that supported restoration efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and Hurricane Irene in 2011.

“It’s tough work, but it’s also very rewarding,” Ross said.

“They had some really strong winds here, a lot of damage to trees and the main power lines … it’s very similar to what our area experienced July 31.”

This is the third time this year alone that OPPD has deployed crews to help fellow utilities in need. The utility supported Evergy in the Kansas City area in January. It also sent mutual aid to help MidAmerican Energy in northern Iowa and ComEd in southern Illinois after powerful winds caused extensive damage to trees and power lines in mid-July. All three of those utilities returned the favor, coming to OPPD’s aid when more than 220,000 customers lost power in the historic July 31 storm.

“It’s extremely gratifying to pay it forward,” said Brian Kramer, senior director of Utilities Operation & Maintenance. “That’s what mutual aid is all about.”

Mountainous terrain ‘is pretty treacherous’

Ross said the area isn’t tropical, like many may picture when they think of hurricanes.

“They had some really strong winds here and a lot of rain, a lot of damage to trees and the main power lines, the backbone of their system,” said Ross. “So, it’s very similar to what our area experienced July 31.”

But the terrain is different.

“The mountainous area here, they call it the ‘hollers,’ where they’ve cleared stuff out for the power lines to go, is pretty treacherous,” he said

Just accessing these remote areas is physically exhausting. The team is working 16-hour days from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., Ross said.

The team is prioritizing safety and trying to complete repairs as efficiently as possible. But the conditions they are encountering, and the complexity of repairs needed, can slow down progress.

“The guys might be working five, six hours to get three people on, or 50, or 2,000.”

Away from their families

It’s also hard to be away from home and their families, and not knowing just how long their work will last or when they will be home.

“The guys leave a lot back home. We have a lot of family members back home that we care about. We want to send them a little shout out and thank them for taking care of things at home and let them know we’re all doing great and we’re staying safe,” Ross said.

“But that’s what we do, restore power. Restoring power and helping communities in need is why many of us chose this line of work,” he said.

“The passion that our crews have to serve our customers, no matter where they’re at, is what drives us. You know, you get exhausted, and it is tiring, but we know what it’s like to be without power. They need us. So, we’re here to help and do what we can.”

The team is heading south to Virginia and will continue to work with Appalachian Power, Ross said Wednesday.

“We’ll stay as long as we’re needed. We know the next time we help, a lot of the utilities we’re helping will be there for us.”