O&R Readies for Severe Weather Tuesday; Strong Gusty Winds, Heavy Rain, Local Flooding Expected

Orange and Rockland Utilities (O&R) is preparing to mobilize its emergency response workforce Tuesday night to repair potential damage and restore possible power outages that could result from strong gusty winds, heavy rainfall and localized, inland flooding throughout the region between 7 p.m. Tuesday and 4 a.m. Wednesday.

This severe storm could pose a significant threat to electric service because its associated high, gusty winds could contribute to downing trees, tree limbs and overhead electric lines – all of which could interfere with the safe, reliable delivery of electric service. The storm is expected to bring 1.5-3 inches of rain and winds sustained at 15-30 mph with gusts of 40-50 mph.

O&R company and contractor overhead line crews and tree removal experts, customer service operators and the rest of the members of the O&R emergency response team will be activated and deployed Tuesday evening. They will be joined by mutual aid crews.

Once the weather clears enough to safely assess damage and begin electric service restoration, O&R crews will give priority to clearing downed wires blocking roads and making repairs to critical and emergency facilities (police and fire stations, and hospitals, for example) and to those locations where the repair will provide power to the largest number of customers as quickly as possible. Then, crews will restore smaller outages and individual customers’ outages.