A single fallen tree cut power to thousands of homes across the West End on Wednesday, Clallam County Public Utility District officials said.
“In the West End, all of the electricity is off,” said Quimby Moon, a PUD dispatcher in Port Angeles at 5 p.m.
“It’s down from the west side of Lake Crescent to Neah Bay, and all the way down past Forks.”
Power was restored about 6 p.m.
Moon said a tree fell and knocked over a power transmission line between substations in Port Angeles and Sappho around 3 p.m.
That caused a break in the flow of electricity that could only be repaired by sending a truck and crew out to remove the tree and repair the transmission line.
“This is not very common at all,” said Moon of the widespread power outage.
“We usually keep clear a pretty wide right of way [for transmission lines].”
West End experience
Pat Soderlind, Forks city events coordinator, said she was driving back from Clallam Bay about 5 p.m. when noticed that everything was dark when she entered Forks.
But blackouts are nothing new to her, she said.
“Living in the West End, we’re pretty used to power outages this time of year,” Soderlind said.
“Sometimes they last a couple of hours; sometimes they last a couple of days.
“Thankfully, this one only lasted a couple of hours.”