Mother Nature shuts down the City

By Erin O'Connor

Staff Writer

WEST SPRINGFIELD Power outages on August 2 shut off electricity for many western Massachusetts residents.

The outages started roughly around 5:30 p.m. - 6 p.m. and before 10 p.m. most residents came back online, Dean C. Nash, spokesperson for the Western Massachusetts Electric(WMECO) said to Reminder Publications last week.

At the outages peak 19,000 customers in total with 3800 in West Springfield were without power said Nash.

"Storm trees had hit the power lines," Jack Dowd of the West Springfield Department of Public Works said was the reason.

"Lightning struck one of the Department of Public Works controllers and knocked it out," he said.

"By 10 p.m. the number went down from 3,800 to 100 for West Springfield," Nash said, "On Thursday by 11 a.m. it was down to 59 for people that were left without power."

WMECO was hoping to have everyone turned back on by early Friday of last week.

The outages occurred on the streets of Monastery Ave. and Piper Rd. and side streets in these areas of West Springfield.

This area was hit pretty hard, said Nash, while the Hampshire County region was hit a little and the Franklin County Region not hit at all.

"The trees come down hitting the electrical wires and causing the electricity to go back into the transformers," said Nash. "There is not much of a defense The electric company can't do much overhead line protection," Nash said, "One thing that we always do throughout the area is look at areas that haven't been trimmed-cutting trees and cutting them back. The storm brought strong winds and it comes through so harsh.Trees were coming down."

"We are thankful for the folks that can do this, who did the job as quickly and efficiently as they could. The goal is to bring up first the circuits that bring up the most people at a time," Nash said.