Thursday, May 31, 2007

Contact Xcel with your power flucuation problems

In regard to my previous blog, another neighbor suggests:
I just talked to a full-service agent at Xcel, andshe recommends that everyone who has noticedrecent fluctuations in electric service shouldphone so that they can understand the magnitudeof the problem and the region affected. She saysthat the number to call is 1-800-895-1999, andselect "outage". If you don't get through to areal person, just select nothing and after about6 prompts, it will ring a real person. Ask thatperson for a full-service agent.We also suspect that we may have had damage tosome of our electrical equipment, even though itwas connected to a UPS (that has been frequentlycycling on-and-off the last few days).

Lighting Caused Power Blips



In a message dated 5/31/2007 9:10:37 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time, savitar@mric.net writes:
Has anyone been experiencing electrical service fluctuations lately? We've been have several episodes of flickering lights, and the computer UPS battery backup systems clicking & coming on. I don't know if it's surges or momentary loss of power. I'm wondering if it's our service only, or if others nearby have experienced anything similar. It's happening at different times of the day, and even when we are not using much electricity.
I read someplace that one Mt. Evans, which is actually visible from my location on Lazy Z, is world famous for the number of lightning strikes it gets.
A lighting storm some distance away can still effect our power here because of the way that the power lines run as they distribute power.

The moral of the story here is that the lighting around here is intense enough that it interferes with our electricity. However, you may just want to check that a recent storm did not blow a tree against the power line to your house. I've had that happen too.
I have included a picture above of the relative number of lighting stikes in Colorado over a 6 year period. I have called out Mt Evans. Boulder County is the rectangle above it with the ragged left edge and a notch half way along its southern boarder. We're just one County away from Mt. Evans.
P.S. Welcome to the joys of living "way out there" at the end of the line, so to speak.