Tag Archives: power outages

CHS Q&A: What’s going on at the 15th Ave E QFC, why did the power go out, and what happened to the Broadway Tacos Guaymas?

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Graffiti, now erased, on the side of the 15th Ave E QFC (Image: CHS)

CHS readers asked, we answered. Here are answers to a Capitol Hill question or three from recent days:

  • What’s going on at the 15th Ave E QFC? Nothing. Or, at least, not what you might want to see if you’re hoping for a new tenant in the big, empty grocery. CHS is told that activity around the store this week is related to Kroger auctioning off equipment from the site and completing an internal demolition of the store. The company closed the grocery in April over the city’s COVID-19 $4/hour hazard pay ordinance. The space has been home to a grocery for 77 years.
  • Why did the power go out? Capitol Hill has become accustomed to avoiding power outages thanks in part to waves of redevelopment overhauling its infrastructure and major investments in public transit upgrading its electrical grid. So, a relatively brief power outage across parts of the Hill and the Central District Monday evening on a not that stormy, not super hot day was a bit of a surprise. Continue reading →

Seattle City Light searches for cause of stubborn POWHat power outage — UPDATE

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The outage as of 4:30 PM Wednesday

One thousand Capitol Hill customers spent Wednesday without power as Seattle City Light crews worked to locate the cause of a stubborn outage somewhere under the densely popular blocks just south of E Olive Way.

Power problems in the Pine-Olive Way-Harvard Ave Triangle were first reported just before 8 AM and have continued through the day.

Approaching the ninth hour of the outage, a City Light spokesperson said that crews were still trying to locate an underground system failure and pinpoint the exact point of the problem. A 7:15 PM restoration estimate posted earlier in the day on the City Light outage map continued to be displayed despite the ongoing search.

The area of the outage is home to hundreds of apartments and homes but away from commercial buildings and restaurants. But with many still working remotely under COVID-19 restrictions, Wednesday’s outage also surely disrupted more than a few businesses.

UPDATE 7:00 PM: City Light crews identified the problem and were reported working to make repairs starting around 5:30 PM. The plan was “energizing roughly half of the customers out of power” and then to briefly “deenergize” these customers again before restoring power to everyone. The estimated time for full restoration is around midnight, City Light says.

You can visit seattle.gov/city-light/outages for updates.

 

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Small power outage near Volunteer Park after recycling truck tangles with wires

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Thanks to a CHS reader for these pictures from the scene

A recycling truck’s tangle with wires just off E Aloha created a small power outage Wednesday afternoon south of Volunteer Park.

According to Seattle City Light, around 100 customers were without power starting around 4 PM.

Photos provided by a CHS reader showed a large recycling truck tangled in wires and a snapped off utility pole in the alley next to the Volunteer Park Seventh Day Adventist Church near 13th and Aloha.

Seattle City Light was still investigating the issue and no estimate for restoration of power was available.

 

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Power outage in POWHAT makes COVID-19 inspired ‘working from home’ a challenge on Capitol Hill — UPDATE

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Capitol Hill residents working remotely during the area’s COVID-19 response might be finding it more difficult to be productive in their impromptu “home offices” again Wednesday. A lingering power outage in the densely populated POWHAT — Pine-Olive Way-Harvard Ave Triangle — area is lingering into a second day.

City Light says “equipment failure” is to blame but we haven’t heard back on specifics. People in the neighborhood say the outage has ranged from more than 800 customers to just over 200 out Wednesday morning. City Light currently lists an 11 AM estimated time for restoration of service while the “south line” in the area is returned to service.

Power first snapped off in the area around 1 PM Tuesday. Continue reading →

CHS Pics | The super power heroes of POWHAT

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In the early hours of Friday morning, many residents of the Pine-Olive-Way-Howell-Area-Triangle were going through a night most of us can only imagine in our worst nightmares: no electricity, no TV, no internet. CHS visited the streets of the neighborhood to check out the darkness and found a heroic effort underway. Continue reading →

Second big power outage in week hits Capitol Hill — UPDATE

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A swath of power outage from the Hill’s western slope along E Olive Way all the way to E Pine’s eastern stretches in the Central District left about 6,500 customers in the dark Thursday morning, Seattle City Light said.

With a report of wires down near E Denny and Belmont Ave E around 9:30 AM, Seattle Fire was called to handle the emergency while City Light deployed crews to sort out how to repair the damaged wires and restore power to the area. Continue reading →

Thunder and lightning long gone but Monday morning power outage strikes northern Capitol Hill — UPDATE

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View the latest updates from Seattle City Light

The area came through Saturday’s incredible thunderstorm mostly unscathed but wet branches appeared to be a larger problem Monday morning as a power outage knocked around 7,000 customers offline.

Seattle City light was reporting 6,7000 customers without power in swaths along north Broadway, Roanoke Park, and eastern Capitol Hill along 23rd/24th and Interlaken Park. As of 9:45 AM, City Light said it was investigating a cause and did not yet have an estimated time for restoration.

Witnesses reported hearing loud booms northeast of the Hill just before the outage.

The loss of power triggered alarms and left elevators stuck between floors. Police responded to a false alarm for a possible robbery at a north Broadway bank while Seattle Fire helped in an elevator rescue reported on 14th Ave E.

Saturday night, thousands around the city lost power as an unusually intense thunderstorm produced more than 2,000 lightning strikes across the area.

UPDATE: City Light says its current estimate is a 1 PM restoration of power:

UPDATE x2 11 AM: Restored!

Power has been restored to the North Capitol Hill area. The cause of the outage was due to a tree branch falling on a pair of powerlines. Our crews are also continuing to restore power to those affected by last weekend’s storm. Thank you for your patience.

 

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‘High Wind Event’ — National Weather Service issues Thursday wind warning for Seattle — UPDATE: 9k without power

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The E Prospect “treasure tree” was a sad loss on the morning (Image: CHS)

Officials say there could be gusts up to 60 miles per hour during a windstorm as it cross the Seattle area Thursday.

The National Weather Service has issued a high wind warning for Seattle and the interior lowland through Thursday night:

TIMING…Winds will increase rapidly Thursday morning with the strongest gusts expected for a few hours Thursday afternoon. * IMPACTS…Snapped tree branches and downed trees along with some power outages.

In its latest update, the local NWS forecast says to expect the rain and strongest winds to begin arriving around 10 AM in Seattle.

A windstorm last Friday snapped trees across Capitol Hill but the area was free from major power outages while thousands in the city were without electricity from fallen wires and downed limbs.

Latest updates at seattle.gov/light/sysstat/

UPDATE 12:25 PM: Some 9,000 customers were reported without power across Capitol Hill and surrounding areas, part of nearly 30,000 reported across the city. Around the Hill, branches and wires were reported down along 33rd Ave and there were multiple reports of sparking wires and transformers including along 23rd Ave north of Madison. Seattle City Light is updating outages here but did not have an estimate for restoration for the areas around Capitol Hill as of this update.

UPDATE 3:42 PM: City Light is telling customers its current estimate for restoration of power for the bulk of Capitol Hill’s outages is 7 PM.

UPDATE 7:55 PM: Crews have restored power to all but around a dozen individual customers around the Hill. Meanwhile, a segment of customers that was among the first in the city to lose power this morning near the shores of Lake Washington south of Madison Park remained without power as of Thursday night. According to City Light, around 1,000 customers in that area won’t see restoration until Friday.

Continue reading →

Power knocked out to 12th Ave and eastern edge of Pike/Pine — UPDATE

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UPDATE 9:01 PM: And, just like that, Seattle City Light has restored most of the customers in the area. As you were.

12th Ave from Cherry to Pine was dark Saturday night as a power outage stretched across the area starting around 7:45 PM.

911 callers reported an explosion and sparks near 12th and Cherry but Seattle Fire checked the area and found nothing to respond to and Seattle City Light was continuing to search for a cause of the outage as of an hour after the area went dark.

Several businesses in the area along 12th and the eastern edge of Pike/Pine were forced to close their doors as they waited for power to be restored.

Leschi shooting
If you heard a lot of sirens after the start of the outage, you might have heard the Seattle Police and SFD response to a shooting at a residence on E Superior north of Leschi Park where a teen girl was reported shot in the back. According to radio dispatches, the victim was alert and conscious before being transported to Harborview after the 8:15 PM shooting. Police were searching for a victim reported leaving the scene. UPDATE: SPD says it appears the teen was shot when someone fired a gun from outside the residence and a bullet crashed through the house’s front door.

‘High Wind Warning’ — Forecast says gusty Monday in store for Seattle — UPDATE: Power out to more than 11K around Capitol Hill

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Lights out for QFC

UPDATE 11/13/2017: Above, scenes from a darkened Broadway. More on the night’s power outages, below.
UPDATEx2 11/14/2017: More than 3,000 were still without power Tuesday morning around the Hill — many of them around the Summit Ave area of the Hill. More updates below.

Original Report 11/13/2017 8:57 AM: Batten down the hatches. And charge your mobile devices. The National Weather Service says wild winds will whip western Washington Monday afternoon:

A “High Wind Warning” has been issued for the Puget Sound and Seattle through 9 PM:

* WIND…South 25 to 40 mph with gusts TO 60 or 65 mph.

* SOME AFFECTED LOCATIONS…The I-5 metro corridor from Lewis
county north to Snohomish county. Includes the greater Seattle
area, Bellevue, Tacoma, Bremerton, and Olympia.

* TIMING…Late this morning through early this evening.

* IMPACTS…Falling trees and limbs, power outages, and minor
damage to structures.

While the grid serving Capitol Hill is about as stout as they come thanks to work to move wires underground, big infrastructure investments for Capitol Hill Station, the ongoing development in the area, and First Hill’s medical services core, the leafier edges of the neighborhood and surrounding areas like the Central District have plenty of water-soaked trees and branches.

We’ll be on the watch for any power issues. The Seattle City Light Status page is here. Let us know what you’re seeing. You can check out area streets on the CHS traffic cameras page and see current conditions including recent wind speed readings on the CHS weather page.

UPDATE 4:50 PM: With winds peaking just before 5 PM, Seattle Fire was responding to reported wires down on Belmont Ave at E Olive Way after a tree or branch fell in the area. There were reports of a transformer explosion and wires down across a few parked vehicles in the area. Meanwhile, a tree took down utility lines at 22nd and Prospect around the same time. Continue reading →