With heavy snow and wind in the forecast, Golden Valley Electric Association in Fairbanks is bracing for power outages. GVEA vice president for member services Brian Youngberg said there were already small outages on December 28 due to snow and trees weighing on power lines, and crews have been in the field working to minimize problems.
”Trying to knock snow off of some of the lines and stuff like that to try to help alleviate some of the outages,” Youngberg said.
Youngberg cautioned members to stay away from trees on power lines, and to contact Golden Valley, which will dispatch a crew. The utility is urging members to update their phone number on the utility’s website in advance of the storm. Youngberg said that will enable a new phone system designed to speed outage response.
”The system will automatically recognize if they’re calling in,” Youngberg said. “And it’ll streamline the reporting process and help us in getting the outage logged in our system so we can respond quicker.”
Youngberg said the phone system was installed this summer as the result of recent year’s outages. Those include major winter storm incidents that affected thousands of members.
Dan Bross is a reporter at KUAC in Fairbanks.
