Although many major power outages throughout Salt Lake, Weber and Davis counties had been repaired by late Saturday, thousands of isolated incidents affecting tens of thousands of Utahns had yet to be fixed, and some homes may be without power until Tuesday.
Late Saturday afternoon, one nursing home in the Ogden area had been without power for more than 30 hours.Utah Power spokesman Dave Es-kelsen said new problems Saturday morning, including a broken West Jordan substation, added to the already weighty backlog of isolated broken lines. In some cases, those lines feed power into complete subdivisions.
"From Friday until today, we haven't been able to get ahead because of the many problems that have been reported," he said Saturday afternoon. "As soon as we fix some we get some new ones."
The first winter storm of the season has caused havoc for Utah Power workers, who have been out around the clock trying to repair the damage along the Wasatch Front. All substations, which feed power into large areas, were in working order as of Saturday afternoon. Now crews are dealing with individual home service drops where lines from poles have been snapped or damaged by falling snow-laden branches, Eskelsen said.
"It's going to take us through the weekend to get to all those problems," he said.
Utah Power has a record of all existing problems that have been reported, Eskelsen said. However, people who have not been able to get through should keep calling until they report the problem.
"We haven't hung up our lines. We still have all of our dispatchers and crews working," Eskelsen said. "It's frustrating during these times to get through because so many people are calling, but we are asking people to be patient. We'll get to them as fast as we can.
"We're hopeful that the weather will not give us any more snow, which will greatly help," he said.
The American Red Cross of Northern Utah set up a shelter Friday night at Central Middle School in Ogden. The Red Cross provided food and a warm place to stay to people who lost electricity.
David Lambert, director of emergency services for the Red Cross, said they planned to remain open Saturday night also, and meals were taken in to 150 senior citizens at St. Benedict's Manor, who had been without power for more than 30 hours by late Saturday afternoon. Lambert said the shelter would remain open until power was restored to everyone needing help.
Salt Lake City issued a public service notice on Saturday, saying the public works department will be picking up storm damage debris through the coming week. Workers were handling the most serious problems first: split trees, broken hanging limbs and clearing blocked driveways. Residents of Salt Lake City proper with emergency clearance needs may call First Response at 535-6980. For nonemergency help, call the Urban Forestry Office weekdays from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 972-7818.