(Sept. 28, 2017) Three members of the Berlin Electric Department recently returned from a trip to Orlando, Florida, where they and scores of others from across the country lent a hand in Hurricane Irma relief efforts.
American Municipal Power (AMP) and the American Public Power Association coordinated a nationwide effort of utility workers in the storm-ravaged state.
Berlin, which operates its own electric utility and is a member of AMP, sent Electric Utilities Director Tim Lawrence, Chief Lineman Alan Parkinson and First-Class Lineman Claude Littleton. The three men left on Wednesday, Sept. 13 at about 7 a.m., taking with them two bucket trucks, a digger derrick (or crane truck), and a pole trailer.
They were originally headed to Clewiston, Florida, but found out about a day into the trip “they had enough help down there,” according to Lawrence.
He said flooding appeared to be minimal upon arrival, but the wind damage was severe. Driving through Georgia, Lawrence said they noticed many of the large billboard signs had been knocked over, “poles and all.”
AMP officials redirected the crew to Orlando, where Lawrence said about 150,000 people were initially without power. He said about 12,000 were without power when the Town of Berlin workers arrived.
“We got there at about 7 o’clock at night on Thursday [Sept. 14] and we had to sit through a safety orientation, where they basically handed us a set of specs on how they built their power lines,” Lawrence said. “They went over how everything would work and where we would park our vehicles — things like that.”
Simple enough, only the next day started at 4 a.m. and a bus to headquarters left at 5 a.m. Workers were assigned tasks and a member of the Orlando electric utility was appointed as a guide and helper.
By 7 a.m., the crew was literally dealing with a live wire.
“The very first day that we did hands-on work would’ve been Friday [Sept. 15],” Lawrence said. “We had to replace a three-phase, vertical-angled pole, which was energized — we had to do it while it was still hot.”
Further complicating the situation, Lawrence said the temperature was oppressive, close to 100 degrees, with about 92 percent humidity.
“When you’re working on energized primaries you have to wear safety gear — the rubber gloves and all of that — so, that made it very difficult. It was very hot,” Lawrence said. “About three quarters of that day we spent replacing that pole.
“It was almost unbearable,” he continued. “Some of the linemen were getting sick from the heat and getting heat exhaustion. You had to be really careful about how many hours you could work without taking a break to cool down.”
The extreme heat wasn’t the only danger crews faced. Workers were warned about water moccasins spotted hanging from trees in residential areas, not to mention alligators near large bodies of water.
“The first day of work, they put us on that pole next to a big runoff pond. We’re trying to work on the pole, but we were also looking out for the alligators on top of that,” Lawrence said.
There were also other hazards associated with the nature of the electrical work. Lawrence said two out-of-state linemen were electrocuted and suffered severe burns during the relief effort in Florida, and another worker died after falling from a five-story building in Georgia.
After spending the majority of day literally sweating it out while tending to a precarious pole flowing with electricity, the crew was put on “rear lot” duty, which meant repairing downed power lines on the back-end of properties.
“With up to 115-mile winds, they had a lot of trees down on the power lines, so they actually assigned a tree crew to work with us,” Lawrence said. “Anywhere we had to get in to work on the power lines, if it had trees and stuff down on it we ended up killing the power to the line to allow the tree trimmers to get the trees off the wires, then we would go in behind them and put the wires back up.”
Lawrence said they probably restored power to about 10 homes on Friday, and the crew spent the next two days doing more rear-lot work.
By the time they left, Sunday night, Sept. 17, only about eight customers were still without power in Orlando.
“It’s a really good feeling,” Lawrence said. “One man that we met out there had been without power for seven days. We were just driving down the road and he came running out of his driveway to stop us, and you could just tell he was in desperate need.”
Lawrence said a large tree limb fell across the secondary service line, knocking out power to the man’s house.
“It ripped out his meter base and the mask off his house. He had an electrician replace all of that, but the power company hadn’t been there to put the overhead service back up yet,” Lawrence said. “When we found out what was going on, we stopped and put a new service up for him to get his power restored. He was very grateful.”
He said the entire ordeal had a noticeable impact on the rest of the crew.
“It was an experience for them,” Lawrence said. “I think they realized what it was like for people to be in desperate need of help. Everybody really came together. We worked with different people from Alabama, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Arkansas.”
The return trip took about 25 hours, but Lawrence said “it was well worth” the effort.
He asked to thank the remaining members of the Berlin Electric team, who held down the fort “and made sure everything ran smoothly” during his absence.
Lawrence told part of his story during a Town Council meeting on Monday night. After which, Councilman Dean Burrell, clearly moved, said, “I feel like I should applaud.”
Those in attendance at Town Hall inside the council chambers did so.
Mayor Gee Williams said the entire community was grateful for the efforts of Lawrence, Parkinson and Littleton.
“Please pass on … how much we all respect what you all did,” Williams said.
American Municipal Power (AMP) and the American Public Power Association coordinated a nationwide effort of utility workers in the storm-ravaged state.
Berlin, which operates its own electric utility and is a member of AMP, sent Electric Utilities Director Tim Lawrence, Chief Lineman Alan Parkinson and First-Class Lineman Claude Littleton. The three men left on Wednesday, Sept. 13 at about 7 a.m., taking with them two bucket trucks, a digger derrick (or crane truck), and a pole trailer.
They were originally headed to Clewiston, Florida, but found out about a day into the trip “they had enough help down there,” according to Lawrence.
He said flooding appeared to be minimal upon arrival, but the wind damage was severe. Driving through Georgia, Lawrence said they noticed many of the large billboard signs had been knocked over, “poles and all.”
AMP officials redirected the crew to Orlando, where Lawrence said about 150,000 people were initially without power. He said about 12,000 were without power when the Town of Berlin workers arrived.
“We got there at about 7 o’clock at night on Thursday [Sept. 14] and we had to sit through a safety orientation, where they basically handed us a set of specs on how they built their power lines,” Lawrence said. “They went over how everything would work and where we would park our vehicles — things like that.”
Simple enough, only the next day started at 4 a.m. and a bus to headquarters left at 5 a.m. Workers were assigned tasks and a member of the Orlando electric utility was appointed as a guide and helper.
By 7 a.m., the crew was literally dealing with a live wire.
“The very first day that we did hands-on work would’ve been Friday [Sept. 15],” Lawrence said. “We had to replace a three-phase, vertical-angled pole, which was energized — we had to do it while it was still hot.”
Further complicating the situation, Lawrence said the temperature was oppressive, close to 100 degrees, with about 92 percent humidity.
“When you’re working on energized primaries you have to wear safety gear — the rubber gloves and all of that — so, that made it very difficult. It was very hot,” Lawrence said. “About three quarters of that day we spent replacing that pole.
“It was almost unbearable,” he continued. “Some of the linemen were getting sick from the heat and getting heat exhaustion. You had to be really careful about how many hours you could work without taking a break to cool down.”
The extreme heat wasn’t the only danger crews faced. Workers were warned about water moccasins spotted hanging from trees in residential areas, not to mention alligators near large bodies of water.
“The first day of work, they put us on that pole next to a big runoff pond. We’re trying to work on the pole, but we were also looking out for the alligators on top of that,” Lawrence said.
There were also other hazards associated with the nature of the electrical work. Lawrence said two out-of-state linemen were electrocuted and suffered severe burns during the relief effort in Florida, and another worker died after falling from a five-story building in Georgia.
After spending the majority of day literally sweating it out while tending to a precarious pole flowing with electricity, the crew was put on “rear lot” duty, which meant repairing downed power lines on the back-end of properties.
“With up to 115-mile winds, they had a lot of trees down on the power lines, so they actually assigned a tree crew to work with us,” Lawrence said. “Anywhere we had to get in to work on the power lines, if it had trees and stuff down on it we ended up killing the power to the line to allow the tree trimmers to get the trees off the wires, then we would go in behind them and put the wires back up.”
Lawrence said they probably restored power to about 10 homes on Friday, and the crew spent the next two days doing more rear-lot work.
By the time they left, Sunday night, Sept. 17, only about eight customers were still without power in Orlando.
“It’s a really good feeling,” Lawrence said. “One man that we met out there had been without power for seven days. We were just driving down the road and he came running out of his driveway to stop us, and you could just tell he was in desperate need.”
Lawrence said a large tree limb fell across the secondary service line, knocking out power to the man’s house.
“It ripped out his meter base and the mask off his house. He had an electrician replace all of that, but the power company hadn’t been there to put the overhead service back up yet,” Lawrence said. “When we found out what was going on, we stopped and put a new service up for him to get his power restored. He was very grateful.”
He said the entire ordeal had a noticeable impact on the rest of the crew.
“It was an experience for them,” Lawrence said. “I think they realized what it was like for people to be in desperate need of help. Everybody really came together. We worked with different people from Alabama, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Arkansas.”
The return trip took about 25 hours, but Lawrence said “it was well worth” the effort.
He asked to thank the remaining members of the Berlin Electric team, who held down the fort “and made sure everything ran smoothly” during his absence.
Lawrence told part of his story during a Town Council meeting on Monday night. After which, Councilman Dean Burrell, clearly moved, said, “I feel like I should applaud.”
Those in attendance at Town Hall inside the council chambers did so.
Mayor Gee Williams said the entire community was grateful for the efforts of Lawrence, Parkinson and Littleton.
“Please pass on … how much we all respect what you all did,” Williams said.