No Power For 40,000 SWEPCO Customers After Devastating Storms
Monday, July 8, could go down in the history books as one of the most volatile weather days ever in Northwest Louisiana.
It's been reported that over 60 tornado and other special weather warnings were issued in a few short hours. Numerous tornadoes were reported and we have only begun to be able to focus on the devastation left behind from these incredible storms.
At this writing, I'm only aware of one death related to the storms and that was in the Benton area, but certainly that's one too many.
What we do know is that at this writing at 3:50 am on Tuesday, July 9, SWEPCO is reporting a total of 40,524 customer outages and if the text message I received from SWEPCO is any indication, those customers could be in the dark for a while. Here's that text:
In the wake of tornadoes, energy delivery systems are damaged. Please prepare for extended service loss while we work to restore power safely.
While outages are widespread, it would appear the hardest hit areas are in the North Bossier Parish areas around Plain Dealing and Bellevue.
In South Bossier Parish, areas around Elm Grove, Taylortown and around Lake Bistineau were also heavily impacted.
Other areas hit hard included the North Caddo Parish area around Caddo Lake including Mooringsport and Oil City.
According to a notice from Bossier Parish Sheriff Julian Whittington, some of the roads that SWEPCO crews will need to use to address the situation are still inaccessible.
The path of destruction began in the southern part of the parish in Elm Grove and is still being assessed all the way up to the Highway 2 area in Plain Dealing. Areas that are heavily affected are the Bellevue/Wafer Road areas in Haughton, Linton-Bellevue/Crouch Road area and the Old Plain Dealing Road area in Benton. Sheriff Whittington urges everyone to avoid the affected areas so damage can be further assessed and removed from roadways and powerlines.
Sheriff Whittington also would also like to remind everyone that some roads heavily affected could be closed for some time.
To report a SWEPCO Outage, check outage status, or sign up to get notifications regarding the power outage in your area, just go to swepco.com/outages.