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Power Could Be Out For Days Near Huntington Mills

HUNTINGTON TOWNSHIP — Utility officials in Luzerne County said it could take several days before the power is back on for hundreds of homes, businesses, a...

HUNTINGTON TOWNSHIP -- Utility officials in Luzerne County said it could take several days before the power is back on for hundreds of homes, businesses, and farms.

The Back Mountain was hit hard. Crews are still trimming downed trees along Grandview Avenue in Dallas Township.

UGI said there are still 11,000 homes and businesses without power in Luzerne County.

To the west of the Back Mountain,  more roads were closed and even livestock killed in Tuesday night's storm.

UGI said 40 extra workers from other utility companies were called in to Luzerne County to help fix twisted electric lines hit by toppling trees like those along Route 239 near Huntington Mills.

The lights were out but the Huntington Mills Grocery Store was still open for a few hours. The owner of the only store in this rural community said he was told the power may not come back on until this weekend.

Without a generator, Mihir Patel says he knows that the refrigerated goods he could not move to another store will have to be tossed out.

"We already emptied out all of our coolers and freezers and stuff. We might get our power on Monday," Patel said.

Just over the line in eastern Columbia County, the Keeney family said that they found two dead cows in their pasture, which they believe were hit by lightning. And those dairy cows were not the only victims of this storm.

"The power line fell right in the pond. We were out taking PPL out to fix the one pole and saw all the fish in the pond dead. They were all belly up," said Dan Keeney.

Keeney said he's thankful that his farm near Benton was not damaged and his family and folks who help out on the farm were not hurt. The challenge now is figuring out how to make sure more than 100 cows are milked.

"They're supposed to get the power on right now. They cut a loop out so they can get just us power so we can milk and stuff and get everything done, but then they're going to shut it back off again."

Because there's no word on when the power will be restored in Dallas and throughout Luzerne County, UGI said it has set up a cooling station at the West Side Career and Technical Center cafeteria in Pringle. People can get water, ice, charge their cell phones, and shower there until 8 p.m. and it will reopen at 8 a.m. Thursday.

Power Outage Maps:
PPL Customers: https://www.pplelectric.com/my-account/outage-center/outage-map.aspx
UGI Customers:http://www.ugi.com/portal/page/portal/UGI/Outage_Center/Outage_Map
Penelec Customers: http://outages.firstenergycorp.com/pa.html

 

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