Clear skies. Low 52F. Winds light and variable..

Clear skies. Low 52F. Winds light and variable.

Problems originating with Virginia-based Dominion Power were responsible for a late-night electric outage on Sunday in Tarboro and Edgecombe County that affected an estimated 7,000 customers.

Tarboro Electric Utilities Director Chip Dickson said he was notified by Dominion at 7:09 p.m. of a momentary outage that affected four Town of Tarboro substations.

Dickson said he received another automated message from Dominion at 10:59 p.m. of a sustained outage that affected the same four substations.

Dickson said after the second call, the town’s on-call crew was dispatched to inspect the town’s transmission line, determining that it was not the cause.

He said he received a call from Dominion at 11:49 p.m. stating all power had been restored and that a fault had been found on the Edgecombe-Martin County Membership Corp.’s transmission line feeding the Davistown-Mercer substation.

Dickson said he had reached out to Dominion Energy for an additional explanation.

The town had approximately 4,500 customers affected by the outage as were approximately 2,500 membership corporation customers.

Edgecombe-Martin began updating its customers at about 11 p.m. through posts on Facebook.

“Edgecombe-Martin is experiencing a large power outage affecting approximately 2,500 people at this time due to a Dominion transmission line that feeds our Davistown-Mercer substation.

“Dominion Power who owns and maintains the transmission lines serving the substation is aware of the outage and currently has crews dispatched to determine the cause and to make repairs as soon as possible.”

A little over an hour later, at 12:20 a.m., an update was posted that read, “Edgecombe-Martin crews have located the problem in the substation. There is a bad lightning arrestor on the mobile substation tap. They are currently working to make repairs and hope to have power restored shortly.”

Ten minutes later, Edgecombe-Martin posted that power had been restored, but 30 minutes later updated again with, “There are still parts of Temperance Hall, High Level and Pleasant Hill road without power. Crews have been made aware and are currently working to find the problem.”

At 2:15, Edgecombe-Martin reported that all power had been restored.

There were almost 100 posts to the Tarboro 27886 Facebook page about the outage before Facebook automatically turned off responses due to the volume.

Most of the posts were about locations without power although spots off West Wilson, along N.C. 33 in Princeville, Pender Square Apartments and along Barlow Road had power.

Power in downtown Tarboro was restored at about 11:50 p.m.

Despite a lack of power, both the Tarboro Police Department and Edgecombe County Sheriff’s Office reported no problems due to the blackout.

Tarboro Police Chief Jesse Webb said his agency provided high-visibility patrols to deter thieves from taking advantage of the situation.

“We did not have any significant issues as a result of the power outage. With that said, we did experience an increase in calls for service as well as a significant increase in emergency (and) non-emergency telephone calls coming into our 911 Center,” he said. “The increase in calls for service were mostly related to false burglar alarms and fire alarms. In addition, during the first 45 minutes of the power outage, the Tarboro Police-Fire Communications Center received over 200 telephone calls.”

Edgecombe County Chief Deputy Gene Harrell said he was not aware of any issues arising during the power outage.

“It was business as usual for us,” he said. “All backup power supplies worked as expected.”

www.RockyMountTelegram.com 1151 Falls Road Suite 2008 Rocky Mount, NC 27804 Main Phone: 252-446-5161 Customer Care Phone: 252-329-9505

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