Winter weather is sweeping through New York, and it\u2019s not just leaving behind flurries and slick conditions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Trees down, roofs blown off and buildings partially collapsed were just some of the damage witnessed as high winds, flooding and snow blew through New York.<\/p>\n
\u201cAcross New York state, we have had nearly 120,000 outages,\u201d said Florencia Feleder, public information officer for\u00a0New York State Electric & Gas and Rochester Gas and Electric.<\/p>\n
Utility companies worked to turn the power back on.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey go out in snow, freezing cold temperatures, high winds, to respond,” added\u00a0Feleder. “Some of the considerations that most folks don’t even think about is falling debris, especially when it’s a windy, slippery ground.\u201d<\/p>\n
This time, the odds were in their favor.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe worst of the weather was around 1 or 2 p.m., so it’s obviously daylight, clear conditions for our people to work safer, work faster,\u201d said Feleder.<\/p>\n
Within 24 hours, NYSEG, RG&E and National Grid had most power back on.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t just the conditions that factored in. Preparation was key, too.<\/p>\n
NYSEG pre-staged more than 525 crews ahead of the weather. National Grid had around 500.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe look at the weather every day, whether it’s eight degrees or 88 degrees, and we knew what was in store,\u201d said David Bertola, spokesman for National Grid.<\/p>\n
Recent upgrades played a big role too.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the course of the past couple of years, we’ve been installing tree wire, installing stronger poles and installing devices to remotely restore customer,” said Feleder. “…16,000 customers were successfully remotely restored during this past event, which is pretty significant.\u201d<\/p>\n
At a dry ice handout to assist those with power outages, there weren’t too many people waiting, at least not this time.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’ve been lucky in Western New York that we haven’t really had a widespread power outage event like this in over a year. Knock on wood, I probably just jinxed the entire region,\u201d laughed Bertola.<\/p>\n
With the blizzard, tornadoes and other severe weather of yesteryear serving as lessons, crews remain ready to respond as best they can.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes a special kind of person to do that work,” said Bertola. “I’m glad they’re on our team.\u201d<\/p>\n
As we continue to see snow fall, more issues could pop up.<\/p>\n
If you see any downed power lines, make sure to stay away from them by at least 30 feet. You can also call 911.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Winter weather is sweeping through New York, and it\u2019s not just leaving behind flurries and slick conditions.\u00a0 Trees…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":85047,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2024,13932,113,256,257,2025,9,24,55,54,49,12,56,115,33018,200,13934],"class_list":["post-85046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-app-in-the-community","tag-app-weather-stories","tag-buffalo","tag-capital-region","tag-central-ny","tag-community-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-news","tag-ny","tag-rochester","tag-viktoria-hallikaar","tag-vod","tag-weather-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85046","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85046"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85046\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}