Ameren Illinois Utilities Completing Service Restoration Today; Customers Without Power Asked to Call
September 16 2008 - 12:55PM
PR Newswire (US)
Service Restored to more than 49,000 Customers since Sunday PEORIA,
Ill., Sept. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- The Ameren Illinois Utilities
estimate all customers who lost electric service in the wake of
Sunday's storms will have their service restored by late this
afternoon, 24 hours earlier than initially estimated. Any customer
still without service is urged to call their Ameren Illinois
Utility (AmerenCIPS - 1-888-789-2477; AmerenIP - 1-800-755-5000).
In addition, customers should call if they are aware of tree limbs
or branches that are hanging on or otherwise touching electrical
lines, transformers or other electrical equipment. Customers are
warned to never touch or attempt to move a tree limb, branch or any
other material that is in contact or could come in contact with
electrical lines, transformers or other equipment. At 11:00 a.m.
today, the Ameren Illinois Utilities had restored service to more
than 49,000 customers following Sunday's storms, leaving about 400
customers without service. The storms, which produced heavy rains
and damaging winds, brought down distribution and transmission
poles and sent tree limbs and even whole trees crashing through
power lines. In many of the impacted areas, the National Weather
Service had issued high wind warnings. "We thank our customers for
their understanding and patience as we worked diligently to restore
power following Sunday's storms," said Ron Pate, Ameren Illinois
Utilities vice president of Regional Operations. "Furthermore, I am
appreciative of the effort put forth by our employees and
contractors who worked under difficult conditions to make this
restoration effort possible." To meet the challenge of the storms,
spawned by the remnants of Hurricane Ike, the Ameren Illinois
Utilities with local employees, reassigned employees and outside
contractors had 780 field personnel to restore service in Southern
Illinois, including linemen, tree trimmers and support personnel.
In addition, the Ameren Illinois Utilities sent two of their storm
trailers to Anna to serve the Southern Illinois areas hardest hit
by the storm. A storm trailer is a mobile storeroom with the
supplies line crews need to restore service. The Ameren Illinois
utilities serve 1.2 million electric and more than 840,000 natural
gas customers in a 43,700-square-mile area of Illinois. DATASOURCE:
Ameren Illinois Utilities CONTACT: Leigh Morris, +1-217-535-5228,
or Neal Johnson, +1-309-677-5284 Web site: http://www.ameren.com/
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