TheTimesTribune.com, Corbin, KY

Local News

Discussion

July 19, 2012

Electric outages hit Corbin

TheTimesTribune.com, Corbin, KY

CORBIN — By Jeff Noble, Staff Writer

Sections of Corbin were hit by power outages during the late afternoon and early evening Wednesday. Officials say the outages over three areas of Corbin affected between 75 to 115 customers before power was restored.

Steve Carmichael, Electrical Superintendent of Corbin City Utilities, said the cause of the outages may have been a small random tree limb that fell on the lines. He added the heavy rains from strong to severe thunderstorms in the Corbin area between 2 - 3 p.m. could have contributed to the problem.

The vast majority of the outages affected customers on the Whitley County side of Corbin.

Carmichael said power went off just after 5:15 p.m. and affected part of downtown, halfway up Gordon Hill, North Kentucky Avenue, South Kentucky Avenue and Chestnut Street. The electricity came back on around 6:25 p.m. About 75-100 customers with CCU were affected by the outage.

The outage came during the afternoon rush hour, and caused problems with stop lights in the downtown area, causing Corbin Police and Corbin Fire Department personnel to help out with traffic at some of the intersections, including Main Street at Gordon Avenue and North Kentucky Avenue at Gordon Avenue.

“We got back on pretty quickly, considering the time of day and traffic,” Carmichael noted.

Two outages affecting 10-15 customers were reported by Kentucky Utilities in Corbin — one in Knox County, the other in Laurel County.

According to KU’s website, the Knox County outage happened at 6:45 p.m. Wednesday evening, and affected the Standard Avenue area of East Corbin. KU said less than five customers were affected by the outage, with power in that area expected to be restored around 9 p.m.

The other KU power outage was in unincorporated North Corbin, affecting the area along the Cumberland Gap Parkway (U.S. 25E), east of the Exit 29 interchange of I-75. That outage occurred at 6:16 p.m. KU reported 11 customers affected in the area, with power expected to be restored around 8:30 p.m.

Text Only
Local News