Updated: 17,000 Without Power Tuesday in Upper Montgomery County
Power outage forces closure of Germantown Library, BlackRock Center for the Arts
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(Updated 8:06 p.m.) Power has been restored to 17,000 Potomac Edison customers in Montgomery County, Potomac Edison spokesman David Kline told Patch.
Kline said the power was restored at around 8 p.m.
(Updated 6:42 p.m.) Germantown Library, BlackRock Center for the Arts and Upcounty Regional Services Center were forced to close Tuesday due to a massive poweroutage that left nearly 17,000 Potomac Edison customers in Northern Montgomery County in the dark.
All programs scheduled for these facilities are cancelled for this evening, a county spokeswoman said.
Library patrons are asked to check www.montgomerycountymd.gov/library for the latest update about the re-opening of library on Wednesday.
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(Original) Nearly 17,000 Potomac Edison customers near Germantown are without power, a spokesman from the power company confirmed.
WTOP initially reported the story and said a problem at a substation caused a transmission line to go out.
David Kline, a Potomac Edison spokesman, told Patch that four other substations were lost, as a result.
“Pretty much that entire end of Montgomery County is out right now,” Kline told Patch.
Kline said crews were working to isolate the problem, but said it was too soon to give an estimate of how long it would take to restore power.
Outage maps at Potomac Edison showed that 7,850 Germantown customers were with out power.
“We have every available resource working on it,” Kline said.
Meanwhile, there were 156 outages reported among Pepco customers east of Sam Eig Highway. Pepco spokesman Bob Hainey said a problem with underground cables caused those outages and that crews were working to restore power.
Sharon
6:05 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Curious to know the cause since today was a beautiful day in the Gaithersburg and Germantown area. No wind; no rain; no snowstorm. And, thank God, spared the brush fires experienced in Bethesda. Told Greg someone must have 'sneezed' to cause the outage in Germantown. Hummm! LOL!
Dawn
6:25 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
What? And just when I was bragging about us vs. PEPCO!
Michele Bastaldo
6:59 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
I just moved to a new neighborhood. I was so glad it was a neighborhood that did not have Pepco. Called Potomac Edison this evening and was told that the estimated time to fix the problem is 7:00 PM. Well it is 6:57 PM. I will believe it when I see it.
Susan
7:14 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Impacted by the outage today- but first outage I've had in 6 years. Love Potomac Edison and my underground lines.
Jay
7:37 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Any idea what time the power will come back? Is there any website potomac update the staus?
Michael
7:43 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
I had to come to the Internet to find out why the outage happened. When I called in the custome service reps didn't have a clue.
Michael
8:00 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
The power is has been restored at 7:50 pm :)
tomy345
8:44 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Accident guys happen so lets just hope it's nothing major.
Matt
9:28 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
If this was Pepco, it would have been three days instead of three hours. Considering this is Potomac Edison's first outage in I think 12 years, I won't complain.
Joe Thomas
10:28 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Please stop whining. Stuff happens. Transformers blow, central stations have malfunctions, people run into poles. It happens. Its not 15 degrees outside or 95.
Fran Asbeck
8:10 am on Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Who's this Hongfeng character? This is NOT the place to flog his leather goods.
Teresa
11:06 am on Wednesday, January 9, 2013
I can't complain about Potomac Edison. We didn't lose power in either the Dorecho or any of the major hurricanes (Ivan). Three hours is not bad. It did however knock out my Fios service, so even though the power is back, my phone, tv and internet is not.
Matt
8:52 am on Thursday, January 10, 2013
Teresa, It is the battery backup power supply in your basement. The same thing happened to me. For some reason, the battery is being drained, even with AC power restored. It dies, and your ONT gets no power. I replaced the battery last night, and it drained overnight and is dead again. I'm calling VZ today to get someone to come repair it. The power supply must have gotten fried when the power came back on.
K. Cavell
11:17 pm on Thursday, January 10, 2013
We also experence at my home, fried the verizon box in the basement. The repair guy that came out today said most of the Fios units that blew were ones that were first installed. It is now common practice if called to a verizon home with issues they replace the box at no charge. They have all been upgraded, but only change them out if they blow or come to your home for service.
Fran Asbeck
12:45 pm on Thursday, January 10, 2013
Hey, Patch. You posted a map with color keyed areas. Why? The map does not indicate which, if any, keyed area mapped to the power ojutage area, or where the substation was located. So why bother with the map?