Power restoration continues in Warren County following Winter Storm Riley

REC crews work to restore power after a powerful wind storm caused outages for thousands of customers. / Photo from REC Facebook page

WARREN COUNTY – Workers from utilities in Virginia and three other states  have traveled to the Shenandoah Valley to help with power restoration, following Winter Storm Riley that brought down utility lines in vast numbers.

Officials with both Rappahannock Electric Cooperative and Shenandoah Valley Electric Cooperative say that crews are working around the clock to restore power.

REC vice president of engineering and operations, Ron Harris said the utility began feeling impact late Thursday. February had unusually large amount of rainfall, he said, which saturated the ground.  The soft ground, along with Thursday evening’s high winds caused broken poles, cross arms and conductors.  In some cases, he said, restored services were being taken down by falling trees.

By 8 a.m. Sunday over 16,000 members remained without power, and officials estimated that some restorations efforts would extend into the week.
About 1,000 separate outage events remain. according to an update on Rappahannock Electric’s website. Each represents anywhere from one outage to several hundred. Those outages are widespread among REC’s 22-county service territory, though most remain in the counties of Culpeper, Fauquier, Greene, Madison, Rappahannock, and Warren. Many of the outages require significant repairs to infrastructure.

As of 8:20 a.m. Sunday, about 251 members were without power in the SVEC service area. Officials indicated that crews would continue working throughout the day to restore power and hoped to have most power restored by Subday evening.