Staff
West-end residents and businesses experienced a power outage for just over an hour yesterday morning after a component failure, the Fort Frances Power Corp. reported today.
FFPC CEO and president Joerg Ruppenstein said a lightning arrester, a protection device which redirects and grounds lightning so it doesn’t do any damage to the FFPC’s electrical system or its customers, apparently had been hit and damaged by lightning during the summer.
But the damaged component did not short out and take the feeder down until yesterday.
“When you have components that have a crack in them and water gets in them, when it gets cold it just blows them apart, damages them,” Ruppenstein explained.
The power went out around 9 a.m. FFPC crew members responded right away, identifying and fixing the problem within about an hour.
Ruppenstein said it was fortunate the outage happened in daylight as this made it much easier for the crew to pinpoint and fix the problem.
The lightning arrester was located behind Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Ruppenstein said the interruption affected residents and businesses on that block, as well as those to the west (King’s Highway, Colonization Road West, etc.)
He added it’s unfortunate the power interruption happened, but these things can and do happen, especially in the winter.
“When it gets cold, you inevitably test the weakest link in the system,” he remarked.
