KENOSHA, Wis. — A powerful line of thunderstorms has left tens of thousands of We Energies customers across southeastern Wisconsin without electricity, and the utility is warning some residents that the damage is so extensive that restoring power could take multiple days.
As of about 9:20 p.m. Monday, We Energies was reporting 78,322 customers without power across its service territory, including 30,643 customers in Kenosha County alone. Kenosha County had the highest number of reported outages of any county served by the utility.
Milwaukee County was reporting 14,748 customers without power, followed by Outagamie County with 14,695, Winnebago County with 9,863, and Racine County with 3,516. In total, We Energies was tracking 771 separate outages.
Many customers also received an automated phone call from We Energies advising that widespread storm damage had caused significant damage to electrical infrastructure. According to the message, repair crews are responding, but the extent of the damage means that some customers may be without electricity for multiple days before service can be restored.
The outage map showed hundreds of separate outage locations throughout Kenosha County, with particularly heavy concentrations in the eastern portion of the county, where the strongest storms moved through Monday evening.
Utility crews will first focus on repairing major transmission lines and substations before working on neighborhood distribution lines and individual service connections. Restoration times will vary depending on the amount of damage in each area.
Residents are urged to stay away from any downed power lines and assume they are energized. Any downed wires should be reported immediately to We Energies or 911 if they pose an immediate danger.
Customers can monitor restoration progress through the We Energies outage map and report outages if they have not already done so. With severe storm damage spread across multiple counties, restoration efforts are expected to continue around the clock until power is restored.
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5 Responses
This is a fucking joke. Work harder. Several days? GTFO.
Ahh yes, because restoring power to nearly 80,000+ customers is something that can be done with haste! Let’s see you sign up to fix the 10,000+ volt power lines. Do it quick!
it’s a little more involved than the ding fries are done in your line of work
Any idea where I can turn to to get assistance for my mother in law and sister in law who are both on oxygen. WE energies won’t help them and neither will the Red Cross. I called the police department non emergency number to see if they knew of where we could get assistance and they said we energies. Any ideas?
Their oxygen DME company should have emergency backup tanks available. These tanks are huge and can last quite some time for typical usage. I would try checking with them to see what options are available!