Power crews and clean-up crews hard at work in Union County/Updated

UPDATE 9:50 PM, Saturday night, Oct. 26

Saturday’s sudden thunderstorm brought winds of over 70 mph to northeast Mississippi causing widespread damage over two counties.

Several thousand customers of New Albany Lights, Gas, and Water (NALGW) lost electrical power Saturday afternoon. NALGW Manager Bill Mattox said mid evening Saturday, “I would estimate we still have 1,000-to 1,500 customers without power. We are working to repair our backbone (3 phase) feeds.

“Our crews will probably work until around midnight or so and then get back early in the morning. We still have a lot of outages particularly in the eastern part of our service territory from Blue Springs around to Highway 15 north. Even in areas where we have restored our backbone feed there are pockets of outages. We have outages around Myrtle and Blue Mountain.

“If you see that your neighbors have power and yours is out please call our office at 534-1041 to report it.

ORIGINAL POST

Power and clean-up crews were working throughout Union County as daylight was fading Saturday afternoon.

Quick action by the power crews of New Albany Lights, Gas, and Water (NALGW) allowed the show to go on – albeit a little late at the Cine’ Theater. Power at the theater and throughout much of the NALGW service area failed when a widespread storm with strong winds struck about 12:30 p.m.

A near capacity crowd was waiting at the theater when the dedicated NALGW guys got the lights back on about 2:45 p.m. Then the curtain rose for the Union County Public Schools’ production of the musical “Grease.” The Saturday evening Grease performance is expected to begin on time.

Wind damage to the power grid throughout Union and nearby counties was extensive. NALGW Manager Bill Mattox told NAnewsweb.com at 5:15 pm that there were still many customers in the rural areas still without power. Mattox said he thought that areas north and east of New Albany were the hardest hit. Many power poles have been snapped off and long spans of electrical lines are down.

NALGW crews will work through the night and into Sunday to restore power in their service area. However, Mattox said it could be Monday before all customers in rural areas had power restored.

Union County Emergency Management Director, Curt Clayton, said late Saturday afternoon he knew of no injuries from the storm. Clayton said clean-up crews were hard at work trying to get everything back to normal as quickly as possible.

NAnewsweb.com will post updates as they are available.