Why Did EREC Cut Off Power For Thosands? Why Wasn’t I Notified?

February 28, 2024

For about three hours Monday night and into Tuesday morning, nearly 2,100 Escambia River Electric Cooperative customers were without power in Oak Grove, Walnut Hill, Enon, Barrineau Park, Bogia and Molino areas.

The outage was from about 11 p.m. Monday to 2 a.m. for scheduled maintenance.

EREC said their supplier, PowerSouth, requested the outage to perform maintenance on the transmission line serving the Oak Grove substation. The outage impacted all EREC customers in the area served by the Oak Grove substation on Highway 99A.

“PowerSouth is currently upgrading transmission lines in our area to enhance the reliability, capacity, and robustness of the system. The outage was necessary to work on a power pole and install a switch on the upgraded line,” EREC said. ” The planned outage was scheduled during the late night hours as to not disrupt businesses, schools, etc.”

“Another planned outage is expected in the upcoming months to finalize the adjustments after the switch has been built and tested3″

EREC did work to notify members with phone calls and text messages to members with registered mobile numbers.

“If you were affected but did not receive a call or text, please contact our office to update your information,” the cooperative said, adding that they will never send a text requesting your personal information or any clickable links. This information will solely be used for informative or alert purposes.

The outage included about  2,069 EREC meters Davisville, Oak Grove, Bratt (west of Highway 99), Oak Grove, Walnut Hill, Enon, McKinnon, Barrineau Park and Molino (in the area of Hwy 99) and Bogia.

NorthEscambia.com graphic, click to enlarge.

Comments

3 Responses to “Why Did EREC Cut Off Power For Thosands? Why Wasn’t I Notified?”

  1. People Pleaser on February 28th, 2024 12:16 pm

    This story brings to mind a quote by John Lydgate, “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”

  2. boo on February 28th, 2024 10:56 am

    Or they could have waited for a storm to knock out power and do it then…., hell when i was a lineman i had to work on hot lines all the time

  3. Gayle Weaver on February 28th, 2024 10:05 am

    I appreciate the effort to keep all systems 100% ready. A few hours is nothing to sacrifice compared to days without electricity during a storm. Thank you EREC.

Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News