Our production schedule is such that on Tuesdays, we are finalizing the papers in Malad and Caribou County at the Enterprise office here in Malad.  Most of the time, the drama is a matter of needing to find a missing name for a caption, or realizing that a picture won’t work.  While we do hit some hurdles from time to time, we usually manage to send the paper to the printer by our 5:00 deadline.  

At a little after 2:15 on Tuesday, though, we were all of a sudden in the dark, like everyone else.  Occasional power outages, of course, are no major issue.  We have backups for our systems, and options for some of the related headaches.

But by 3:00 when the expected power-on time moved from a minor inconvenience to, well, the next day, we closed up shop and headed out.  Sherrie and Hope did what most people in town did and went to check on their families and get things ready for a potential long night.

Because we were without internet or power (and my laptop is not the easiest way to edit content), I made the decision to head to safe harbor at my parent’s home in Bannock county which was the closest place I could get internet and a monitor.  As a result, there were some aspects of the outage that we were not directly able to be there for.

One was the planned Public Input meeting on the Impact Zone, which was held at the Event Center.  The Event Center also happened the be the county’s emergency shelter, and was open to the public for anyone who needed power, warmth, or other emergency attention.

The meeting was held as planned, partly because not holding it would necessitate rescheduling a number of things due to notice laws in the state.  A followup meeting may be planned at some time in the future, due to the circumstances.

We also weren’t able to speak to any crews on the ground at the time or Rocky Mountain Power, but here is the story as it has been released.

The power countywide went out at 2:15 p.m., as a result of what Rocky Mountain Power called “an equipment failure” at the substation off Highway 38.  Employees had been on site for several days preceding and at the time of the event working on equipment, though the exact nature of the cause is not clear at present.

At around 5:00 p.m. power was restored to about 500 of the over 3,000 customers who were affected by the outage.  

It was not until 4:44 a.m. that power was restored valley wide.

During the more than twelve hours that power was out, the county’s support networks kicked in, with neighbor-to-neighbor checks having been instigated both instinctively and through response plans put in place over the years by church, county, and city preparation. 

A view of the substation fire, provided by Dot Evanson.

Nell J Redfield, along with the Event Center, was able to function through the use of emergency generators.  The Event Center is the official emergency shelter of the county, and its backup generator has been a project of the last few years under the direction of Emergency Services Director Dan Williams.  While the Event Center was not put to the stress test of high occupancy during the event, it no doubt would have been had the outage continued for a longer span of time, especially in the frigid weather conditions.  The fact that everything worked the way it was supposed to is comforting looking forward to a longer or more devastating emergency.

John Williams, Nell J Redfield CEO, explained that the hospital also continued to operate seamlessly.  “As soon as the power went out, it almost immediately kicked over to the generator,” he said.  The hospital’s reserve power allows it to continue all essential functions and services, regardless of the external power grid.  It is supplied with enough fuel to last a number of days until refueling, and without losing any data or critical functionality.  

Kathy Hubbard explained that some of the lighting is not on the emergency circuit, so residents of the longterm care facility used portable lanterns to add light to their rooms, and had a nice time.  

Congratulations to the city, county, and hospital for their responses, but an especially important thank you should be directed at the community as a whole, who came together to take care of one another.

Here are some excerpts from what people told us about their experiences. 

Kim Sue Evans: “This was a small inconvenience to us, but a major problem for those craftsmen who were onsite. They had to work in the most severe of conditions. Wind,rain,snow and cold. They did a job most of us would find unbearable . My thanks go out to all those individuals and organizations who were involved. Great learning lesson for emergency communications”

Linda Daniels: “great comment and exactly my thoughts!!! I just want to add that it’s amazing how dedicated those craftsmen were, working in such harsh conditions. Thanks to Dax and the entire Rocky Mountain team for their hard work and commitment!!! Please be so safe everyday....”

Brianna Thomas: “Thankfully our generator started right up, my teenage daughter had to get her bother home and take care of the new puppy. My husband and I were in Logan at work and my other daughter’s basketball game out of town. She said they were fine to find food that didn’t need warmed up and their sweaters were doing the job. My 7 year old was excited to get out of school early, until he figured out what a major power outage means. I don’t think he’s ever experienced one of that magnitude before. I am grateful for awesome family that went over and got a fire going in the wood burning stove once she said “it was getting chilly” since we were still gone. Luckily when we did get home, our generator started right up even though it’s been awhile. My husband is bit of an emergency preparedness guy, so he had all the battery powered lights ready to go.

Thank you to the crews for their hard work!!! That can’t be said enough. I hope everyone was able to stay warm.”

Rebecca Smith: “We’ve dealt with outage during high heat (110 degrees in Cali) and now an outage in the very cold. The situations and needs are similar in some ways, but vastly different. We drove to Tremonton to get food and two of my adult kids were talking about all the outages as kids. They were never scared as we always made it fun. Grilling, hide and seek (in the dark especially was fun) and how different the major outage is as an adult.”

James Kidder: “My generator was locked up when I needed it most so word to the wise check your needed maintenance on all engines even if it’s still “newer” because stuff happens normally when you need it most.”

Kristy King-Zahn: “With my husband out of town I had to learn how to work the generator on our camper and troubleshoot it not staying running. Luckily my hubby had wifi on his flight to the East Coast and I could call my father in law in AZ. Once it started I got the furnace on the camper started. My kids and I checked on some friends and then drove out to the substation so I could show my kids all the people that would be working all night to get us power again. I had picked up food in Tremonton when we were there for a class and a planned dinner of grilled cheese and applesauce turned into cereal and applesauce since the propane wasn’t running to our camper stove. My kids joined me in my bed. We played Old Maid and Uno, they stayed up two hours past bedtime but hopefully have some good memories about the time we lost power. We stayed warm all night despite running out of propane prior to 2am with an inside temp of 56 (from 68 at bedtime) and then waking up to the camper being 46. You wouldn’t know it under all our blankets. It was a less than ideal situation but I think everyone was looking out for each other and that is part of what makes our little part of Idaho so special.”