For eductional purposes only

Brooklyn Blacks Out

About 3,500 Residents Lose Power Wednesday Night Affects Brownsville, East New York, Highland Park, New Lots and Canarsie

(NEW YORK) (AP) About 3,500 Brooklyn residents were left without power Wednesday night due to equipment problems.

The neighborhoods affected included Brownsville, East New York, Highland Park, New Lots and Canarsie.

A Con Edison spokesman asked customers in those neighborhoods to cut back on the use of electrical appliances, including washers and dryers, air conditioners and dish washing machines.

The spokesman noted that the power outage was due to problems with feeder cables, not a lack of supply of electricity.

http://cbsnewyork.com/topstories/StoryFolder/story_1174384625_html/index_html

-- K (infosurf@yahoo.com), June 28, 2001

Answers

PSC Blasts Con Ed Outage

By BILL FARRELL Daily News Staff Writer

he Public Service Commission warned Con Edison against neglecting its distribution system yesterday, one day after 10,000 Brooklyn homes lost power on a sweltering night.

"I am disappointed that Con Edison's system failed last evening, resulting in the loss of power to approximately 10,000 customers," said Robert Simpson, executive deputy to the chairman of the PSC, in a statement.

"It is important to note that this outage was not due to inadequate supplies of electricity, but equipment failures," he said.

Con Edison officials acknowledged that equipment failure rather than demand caused by 90-degree temperatures Wednesday caused the outages.

The failures began at 6:20 p.m., when about 3,500 customers in Bushwick lost service. Outages then rolled along the eastern end of Brooklyn through East New York to Canarsie and Spring Creek in about 20 minutes.

"The outages had nothing to do with a lack of power," said Con Edison spokesman Chris Olert. "The problems were caused by a series of feeder cables."

The problem was traced to aging feeder cables at Livonia Ave.

"The feeders are like fancy circuit breakers," said Olert. "Sometimes you can lose four or five of them and the power will keep going. Sometimes you can't."

Most of the customers at the northern end of the borough had their electrical power restored within the hour, said Olert. But some 3,500 residents in Canarsie were in the dark until shortly before 2 a.m. yesterday.

In the summer of 1999, 73,000 customers in northern Manhattan were without power for as long as three days, and Con Edison agreed to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to upgrade its aging power transmission system.

"Two years ago, Con Edison committed to increasing and accelerating investment in its distribution system to prevent this type of occurrence. These are not the results we expect," Simpson said yesterday.

Con Edison rejected any notion that it had been neglecting its equipment.

"We've made some very substantial investments in our distribution system — nearly half a billion dollars this year alone. We're not happy if even one customer goes out," Con Edison spokesman Mike Clendenin said in response to the PSC statement.

http://www.nydailynews.com/2001-06-29/News_and_Views/City_Beat/a- 116583.asp

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), June 30, 2001.