PORTLAND, Ore. — After wind, snow and bone-chilling cold, over the weekend line workers bracing the freezing temperatures to restore power comes as a welcome sight. Tens of thousands of customers who lost power and heat, got it back by Monday evening.
Portland General Electric (PGE) said at the height of the outages on Saturday, more then 160,000 were without power, after 850 distribution lines came down. Around 3 p.m. on Monday, that number ticked down to 60,000 without power. As of 10 p.m. Monday night, just under 40,000 customers were effected.
PGE alone called in extra crews from neighboring states and other parts of Oregon to assist in the repair and restoration efforts. A spokesperson told KGW, a total of 1,400 people were supporting these efforts and that those additional crews will stick around through Tuesday's icy weather.
Despite these increased efforts, many remain without power including residents of a Southwest Portland apartment building. According to the outage map, power won't be back on for the Morrison until 10 p.m. on Tuesday.
"We just don’t know when it’s going to come back on or what is going on," said Jon Wong, a tenant. "And there are so many families. There’s a lot of elderly people with disabilities. I have a disability, but it makes it harder, especially when you’re in pitch dark and you’re trying to maneuver or get around."
"I don’t understand... are we on a different power grid? Is it something to do with management? Because it's like, it’s the only building," said Xavier Kerney, noting the other buildings in the area that seemed to have power.
Since some of common areas in the building had power such as the community room, hallways and offices. Some residents threw an impromptu potluck in the community room to keep warm and have a meal. They believe these areas are on a generator.
KGW reached out to Home Forward, the leasing office, and to PGE for more details on this specific outage.