Mainland transformer failure causes San Juan Islands power outage

Submitted by Orcas Power and Light Cooperative

The outage on Sunday, Feb. 4 was caused when a transformer on the mainland failed at around 9 p.m. Power was out for all of San Juan County and thousands of Puget Sound Energy customers on the mainland. PSE restored power throughout the area by 2 a.m.

OPALCO continues to work with Bonneville Power Administration and PSE to find solutions for redundancy on the mainland path to our island power supply. OPALCO’s call center was inundated by more than 4,000 calls. Before calling to report an outage, check OPALCO’s outage center (www.opalco.com/outages) on your smartphone to see if your area is already reported and to get updates.