PALMER TWP., Pa. – At times, we may be so wrapped up in our daily routines, that we take our electricity for granted.<\/p>\n
“My wife is on oxygen, and she has to have it,” said Mark Hefele.<\/p>\n
For some people, it’s life.<\/p>\n
“So she could either be here dead or in a hospital,” Hefele said.<\/p>\n
The generator at Hefele’s Northampton County home of 48 years is working overtime, as powerful wind gusts sent his neighbor’s tree crashing onto his lawn, just barely missing his house.<\/p>\n
“Tree sort of exploded. It sounded like a bomb,” said Hefele. “Luckily, it didn’t really hit the house, but the wires got pulled off. “I mean, it really sounded like an explosion. “<\/p>\n
Luckily, no one is hurt. But the aftermath is causing a headache.<\/p>\n
A stop sign is tangled within the tree branches on a closed Baldwin Drive in Palmer Township.<\/p>\n
There’s downed energized wires and drivers need to figure out a new route around the neighborhood.<\/p>\n
Similar situations unfolded in Lehigh County, with traffic detours due to a prolonged closed Chestnut Street in Whitehall Township.<\/p>\n
Many have been in the dark for hours on end. But crews have been working around the clock to clean the damage and turn the lights back on.<\/p>\n
After hours of bundling up in the cold, Don Tillson said he stepped outside for fresh air and some sun<\/p>\n
“We’re just sitting in a house bundle. I had to come out and get some air, and I was nosy enough to see what these guys are doing,” said Tillson.<\/p>\n
The power has been out at his Whitehall Township home of five years since Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
“It was a high wind, and the wind was whipping through. The next thing you know, click,” said Tillson. “There goes the power.”<\/p>\n
Little did he know, a stroll down the block led him to the answer he was looking for.<\/p>\n
“I was watching intently, thinking that they were going to wire us back up. So hopefully that’s what they’re doing,” said Tillson.<\/p>\n
Tillson and thousands of people in the region have been playing a waiting game of will the lights turn back on before the sun starts to set?<\/p>\n
“We rode around the car a little bit, charging up phones, and then we’re just sitting in a house,” Tillson said.<\/p>\n
Businesses are taking the hit as abrupt as homes.<\/p>\n
Down the road, a Sheetz is also feeling the impacts. The pumps are closed and the 24\/7 gas station is sitting in the dark.<\/p>\n
But in all the darkness, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel.<\/p>\n
“”We really haven’t ever lost power here. We just kind of wait, wait it out and try to be patient, and, you know, bear with it the best we can,” said Tillson. “It can always be worse.”<\/p>\n
“Could always be worse,” said Hefele. “But could be a little better too, right?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PALMER TWP., Pa. – At times, we may be so wrapped up in our daily routines, that we…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[119,153,155,154,433,3656,434,2182],"class_list":["post-27543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-allentown","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-lehigh-county","tag-north-whitehall-township","tag-northampton-county","tag-palmer-township"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}