Bend storm knocks out power to nearly 11,000

While major storms knocked out power to millions in the Midwest and East Coast, thunderstorms rumbling through the High Desert knocked out a transmission line and cut power to nearly 11,000 north and northeast Bend residents for up to two hours Saturday evening.

Lightning caused Pacific Power to lose a transmission line around 4:45 p.m., killing power to three substations on Bend’s north and northeast side, said utility spokeswoman Jan Mitchell.

About 10,800 customers lost power when it began, as the outage also darkened traffic signals, supermarkets and businesses of all sorts on a busy summer weekend.

Within 10 minutes, power was restored to almost 2,000 customers, but most of the rest weren’t restored until about 5:45 p.m., Mitchell said, mostly serviced by the utility’s Overpass Substation near the Bend Parkway.

One last group of about 450 customers served by a substation off Hunters Circle didn’t get power back until shortly after 7 p.m., Mitchell said.

Crews patrolled the lines to look for any sign of the cause, and said it likely was a lightning strike, though specifically where could not be determined.

“Whooaaaa,” went up the collective groan at the Albertsons on NE Third Street when the lights went out. Fortunately, large windows at the storefront kept things from being totally black, and battery backup get a couple of checkstands working.

Even after the power was restored, utility crews had work to do – as some traffic lights were flashing red until they were reset.

Radio and TV stations located in the area, including NewsChannel 21, also had engineers scrambling to restore their programming and also their station equipment, much like thousands of residents were doing on a smaller scale, from microwaves and alarm clocks to garage door openers and the like.