Giant tree destroys OPALCO power poles

Twice last week, the west side of Orcas Island, plus all of Shaw, were hit with power outages.

The first one came around 9 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 29, when a 90-foot tree fell onto two power poles in Eastsound, just north of the turnoff from Orcas Road to Main Street. The tree crashed from across the street. If a passing car or pedestrian had been in the line of the fallen tree, the people almost certainly would have been killed, Orcas Power and Light Cooperative General Manager Randy Cornelius said.

The outage, which required the San Juan County Public Works Department to close the road, kept OPALCO employees working throughout the night, plus into the early afternoon the next day before everybody’s power was restored.

Rain and heavy winds caused the tree to fall, but Cornelius suspects that the problem was exacerbated by the recent removal of many trees across the street. “Because of the opening up of the land, the wind got to the trees,” Cornelius said. The removal work was undertaken by the property owner in anticipation that the parcel will soon become the future home of Washington Federal Savings.

Both OPALCO foreman Pete Stoothoff and property owner Derek Mann were aware that a problem existed before the tree came down. A week or two before the storm hit, Stoothoff told Mann that the situation “was an accident waiting to happen.” The property owner agreed to carry out Stoothoff’s recommendation that more trees be removed and more tops be cut. Much of the additional work has since been completed. Unfortunately, Stoothoff said, the storm hit just before the entire job could be finished. If the storm had come one week later, many Orcas residents may have been spared a power outage, he added.

Five Orcas linemen worked for about 20 consecutive hours to get the power restored. Stoothoff acknowledged that the work was tiring, but he noted that all the linemen kept going without a break because they know that their friends and neighbors on relying on them to get the power back on as quickly as possible. He also said that working during a power outage creates an “adrenalin rush” that enables linemen to work long hours, but he admitted that when things run 24 hours or more, eventually they need some rest.

Fortunately, OPALCO had the power poles in stock. If many more had been knocked down, Cornelius said, OPALCO would have had to get them from off-island, and the job would have taken far longer to fix.

Crew members from Orcas were Steve Eidler, Jay Fowler, Douglas Moody, Todd Shaner and Stoothoff. They were joined early the next morning by San Juan Island linemen Rex Guard and Dan Foussard, and Lopez islanders Tim Savage and Bob Belcher.

Cornelius stayed with the crew throughout the night, providing the workers with food and drinks. OPALCO administrative assistant Kate Pruett brought donuts and coffee early the next morning. One islander called OPALCO, asking if she could bring the workers some coffee. Cornelius thanked her for the offer, but said OPALCO was taking care of it.

Tree falling onto transmission line caused Jan. 2 outage

The second outage hit on Jan. 2 at about 1:30 a.m., again leaving the west side of Orcas plus all of Shaw without power. A portion of Lopez Island, by Watmaugh Bay and the ferry landing, also lost power. Most of those affected had their power restored around 6:30 a.m., although a few had to wait until later in the morning before all the work was completed.

The outage was caused by a tree falling onto a transmission line on Lopez. The Lopez crew cleared the tree from the lines but later found a broken insulator that had to be replaced before the power could be restored.

The series of outages is starting to take its toll on the OPALCO linemen, Cornelius said. “We sent some home so they could get some sleep,” Cornelius told The Sounder Jan. 3.

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