Last Tuesday, several areas in Charlotte County experienced four power outages which affected 40 accounts in the southern part of the county, according to information from Mecklenburg Electric Cooperative (MEC).

MEC Vice President of Member and Energy Services David Lipscomb said each of the outages were caused by trees being blown on the line.

“As winds swept across the system, outages began at approximately 11:30 a.m. and continued off and on through the day,” said Lipscomb. “All outages were restored just after 7:30 p.m.”

Throughout Mecklenburg Electric Cooperative’s coverage area, Lipscomb said 31 scattered outages were experienced, which affected about 1,375 homes, farms and businesses.

During that time, a social media post from Charlotte County Public Schools said, “Due to widespread power outage, some office phones are not working at our schools …”

In light of this, emergency fax line numbers were provided for each school in the district.

“To say the least, it was a blustery and busy day,” said Lipscomb. “Crews were spread across the system to clear broken limbs and trees from lines and put downed conductors back in the air. Throughout the year, MEC puts significant effort and resources into maintaining our right of way, but wind events like this blow both live and dead trees from outside the right of way and simply knock out our electric lines,” Lipscomb said.

He said when trees are taller than MEC’s widest right of way at 50 feet, they strike the line. He said that was the reason crews will remove trees which are weak or leaning to maintain the specific area.

“MEC takes seriously its responsibility to serve our members, and being prepared for bad weather starts well before any outage, but when an outage does occur, our teams work diligently to get power restored,” Lipscomb said.

To keep up with future power outages, citizens can follow the outage viewer located on MEC’s website at www.meckelec.org.