Unitil Corporation, (Unitil.com), a provider of natural gas and electricity to customers in New England, opened its system and regional Emergency Operations Center at 6 a.m. this morning in response to a significant winter storm that began impacting the area overnight and is expected to continue through today.
As of 6:30 a.m., 315 customers were without power in New Hampshire.
According to the most recent forecast, 6-14 inches of snow is expected with this system along with winds gusting up to 40 mph in some areas and peak gusts of 45 mph along the New Hampshire Seacoast later this morning and lasting into the afternoon. The snow will be heavy and wet in parts of Unitil’s service regions, leading to the potential for power outages as the sticky snow weighs down trees and branches, causing them to break and impact power lines.
By activating the Emergency Operations Center, Unitil will be able to better coordinate its response to any outages that may occur during the storm. In advance of the storm, additional third-party crews were secured to assist with any restoration efforts.
“As we’ve seen a few times already this winter, when we have snow with a wetter consistency it’s much heavier and easily collects on trees and limbs. The combination of heavy snow and strong winds could certainly create some problems on our system,” Unitil Media Relations Manager Alec O’Meara said. “We’ll continue to monitor the storm throughout the duration of the event and our crews will be ready to respond to outages if they occur and work closely with first responders to address public safety issues as needed during the storm.” In addition to the threat from snow impacting electrical infrastructure, the storm is creating hazardous road conditions, which could result in outages related to motor vehicle accidents.
The snowy conditions have the potential to take wires to the ground. In the event of downed wires, assume all cables and wires that have fallen or dangling are energized and stay away. Be sure to avoid wet ground or puddles near a downed line because water conducts electricity. In addition, keep away from all flooded and debris laden areas because they may be hiding downed lines. Stay in a safe place and avoid driving in damaged areas so you don’t interfere with rescue and restoration efforts.
Unitil will be communicating throughout the event through Public Service Announcements (PSAs), our website, our customer call center and through the media. We also encourage customers to follow along with our storm updates via Facebook, our Twitter feed (@Unitil) and we will be providing real-time outage information online at unitil.com/map.
IMPORTANT NOTE FOR MEDIA:
Unitil asks that when reporting outage information, outlets time stamp the information. Outage numbers change hourly and we wish to make sure the information customers receive is consistent and understandable. Re-Tweets and re-posting of old information without referencing a time can create confusion.
Customers experiencing outages should call 1-888-301-7700 or report online at unitil.com/report-outage.
