Photo by Mary Jane Farmer
By Mary Jane Farmer for The Van Alstyne News / Scene In Town — Jan. 18, 2022
A Tuesday afternoon incident could have turned into a calamity, but for the immediate and good work of people well trained for their job. Plus some other positives.
A semi truck delivering gravel across the street from the newly-developing Central Social District Park when it struck an electric wire while the bed was up high. That caused several transformers in that area, North Preston near East Van Alstyne Parkway, to blow, said City Manager Lane Jones. He was in a meeting at the time, which started at 3 p.m. and it was about 3:10 or 3:15 p.m. when the mishap happened.
Oncor, which handles maintenance for TXU Electric, was quickly summoned to the scene and began their work between the park area and the police station’s parking lot. Two fire department vehicles, with overhead lights on, guarded the Oncor truck during this first repair, turning traffic away and keeping the Oncor truck and the men on the job safe.
Multiple posts on local Facebook pages said that several people saw the transformers blow.
Photo by Mary Jane Farmer
Jones said, and posted on those Facebook pages, he said, that they expected to have the repairs completed before 6 p.m. In fact, electricity was restored about 5:40 p.m., off a total of about 2.5 hours.
Another positive about this situation is that no one was injured, Jones said, as did several people watching the repair work from afar.
Another positive is that the day’s temperatures were the best they have been lately, especially considering it is the 18th of January. In many parts of the United States, Online news reports state, people are being slammed by ‘significant icing’ and treacherous travel conditions, and ‘bitter cold.’ Temperatures Tuesday during this power outage were between 60 and 73 degrees.
And, Oncor conducted its repairs in record time, long before the nighttime temperatures dropped into the 40s.