Power Restored in Lakewood… Or Is It?

ian king November 6, 2012 at 06:46 pm

First, thanks to all the crews that worked such long/difficult hours. YOU are heroes and we thank you. HOWEVER, First Energy needs to be held accountable for a truly horrific job.. I have lived through earthquakes and tornadoes far worse than the tropical storm of Sandy. And never had power off/out for more than 3 days. Besides the lack of heat, hot water, eating out expenses, and for some, hotel expenses, etc. my family lost over $ 300 in food items perishing, and then another $ 200. to restock = $ 500 for food alone! Can we send our unbudgeted food bills to First Energy for their poor decision making/planning? Why did First Energy send their crews to the East Coast when all weather reports predicted a major wind/rain event here in NE Ohio? Shouldn't their priority be NE Ohio? When will Fitzgerald hold a public hearing about why First Energy had such an ineffective emergency plan and such slow power back on? Shouldn't Fitzgerald as County Leader at least be inquiring about why First Energy was so unresponsive for days? And for Lakewood's Mayor Summers, I think he should also be inquiring as to why crews from Duke Energy were the ones who turned on our power at Lake and Cove - where were the First Energy local work units? Why was the Gold Coast area with thousands of residents without power for 5 days while areas of Lakewood less populated had power within hours? What is the city's plan and First Energy's plan now for restoring power quickly in future emergencies?

Michael P. Summers November 6, 2012 at 09:47 pm

Mike Summers
CEI responded to my inquiry about the apparent spike in outages. When a circuit is opened for repair for even one house, their outage map reports that all houses on the circuit are out. Many of Lakewood's circuits have hundreds of houses on it. Thus, 5 open circuits could report 1000+ outages even though there might only be 5 separate issues.

Michael P. Summers November 6, 2012 at 09:54 pm

in response to ian above:
the gold Coast restoration required 9 truck working together all of thursday to revbuild the 12 primary(hi voltage) lines feeding this area. One big tree took down two poles and all of these lines. Repairs were very difficult and required massive manpower and equipment. Poer was restore early Friday morning after a 3.5 day outage. the challenge of restoration was the extensive damage to pole and wire infrastructre, coupled with a shortage of crews and equipment. 200 CEI crews were sent East on Sunday to help NY and NJ. I do not beleive any one foresaw the extent of damage we would/did incur. Out of towncrews from West and South were enroute to the East Coast and rerouted here. I am the Westshore mayors will coordinate a CEI inquiry. We have a long standing West Shore council of governments consisting of lakewood, RR, Bay, N. Olmstead, Westlake, and Fairview park. Each of these communities had serious power outages. We will be meeing Wednesday November 17th.

Jenny Seedhouse November 7, 2012 at 03:01 pm

Please thank Tricia Granfors the Westshore Regional CERT, coordinator for working endless hours with Red Cross and the Westshore CERT members. They were out in the storm as it hit Lakewood helping out police & fire. Also they worked the entire week helping the citizens of Lakewood at the Garfield School shelter. Westshore CERT members were and are a great blessing to all the western suburbs!! Thank you to ALL of you that helped!!

ian king November 9, 2012 at 07:54 am

To Mayor Summers - thanks for your response, but you seem too apologetic for First Energy's poor management of this crisis in your town. This storm exposed deep flaws in the structure of the electrical system and response time in Lakewood. First Energy failed its customers/consumers and needs to be held accountable/responsible. Their recovery plan - if one can call it a plan - was disgraceful and brought undue hardships to thousands of citizens of Lakewood. Mayor Summers - how old is Lakewood's utility system? How obsolete is it? In a time of crisis, how reliable is an outdated electrical system? Why did First Energy send crews out of state when it was predicted early on by all weather channels that Lakewood would experience a major storm? How unprepared was the management of First Energy for this crisis? If First Energy had the poles, the wires, the repair crews, and the transformers, why did it take over 6-7 days to restore power in a small town the size of Lakewood? Why should Lakewood citizens suffer economically, physically, emotionally because First Energy did not reasonably prepare for this eventuality? And how many times a year does Lakewood loose power - 2, 3 or more times? It happens in all the seasons, far too often. Please Mayor Summers/Mr. Fitzgerald, make First Energy answer some tough questions about the state of our local electric utility/system and their emergency response plans. Elected officials should represent their citizens, not pacify power companies.

ian king November 9, 2012 at 07:56 am

To Mayor Summers - thanks for your response, but you seem too apologetic for First Energy's poor management of this crisis in your town. This storm exposed deep flaws in the structure of the electrical system and response time in Lakewood. First Energy failed its customers/consumers and needs to be held accountable/responsible. Their recovery plan - if one can call it a plan - was disgraceful and brought undue hardships to thousands of citizens of Lakewood. Mayor Summers - how old is Lakewood's utility system? How obsolete is it? In a time of crisis, how reliable is an outdated electrical system? Why did First Energy send crews out of state when it was predicted early on by all weather channels that Lakewood would experience a major storm? How unprepared was the management of First Energy for this crisis? If First Energy had the poles, the wires, the repair crews, and the transformers, why did it take over 6-7 days to restore power in a small town the size of Lakewood? Why should Lakewood citizens suffer economically, physically, emotionally because First Energy did not reasonably prepare for this eventuality? And how many times a year does Lakewood loose power - 2, 3 or more times? It happens in all the seasons, far too often. Please Mayor Summers/Mr. Fitzgerald, make First Energy answer some tough questions about the state of our local electric utility/system and their emergency response plans. Elected officials should represent their citizens, not pacify power companies.