O&R Crews Are Wrapping Up Storm Repairs, Restoring Power Today

Orange & Rockland (O&R) expects to complete repairs to storm damage and restore electric service today to the remaining 85 of its 19,795 customers whose electric service was knocked out by the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida that slammed the region Wednesday night into Thursday.

Affected customers should consult O&R’s Outage Map for their individual estimated service restoration time.

O&R crews worked through the night for the second consecutive day last night to return electric service to 19,710 of the 19,795 of its customers who temporarily lost power in the destructive storm. O&R’s Outage Map shows 155 customers without power at 6:30 a.m. today. Eighty-five of those customers have been out of service since the storm. Seventy of the 155 customers listed are out of service because of outages that occurred earlier this morning.

As is typical in the final stages of a large storm power restoration effort, O&R crews are encountering remaining isolated pockets of severe damage to the electric system. Those complex, labor-intensive damage sites are more like rebuilding projects than repair jobs. These locations are generally addressed in the later stages of recovery to expedite overall electric system restoration.

Electric service is restored to all customers whose buildings can safely accept electric service. If it is determined that storm damage has compromised the structural or electric system integrity of an individual’s building, O&R cannot restore electric service there until those issues are resolved by the customer.

For the most up-to-date outage information, please go to O&R’s Outage Map.

Reporting an Outage

If you experience a power outage, don’t assume that O&R automatically knows about it. You can report it and check to see when your lights will be back on through:

At www.oru.com/ReportOutage from any computer or web-based mobile device.
O&R mobile app from your iPhone, iPad or Android device --- download via Apple Store or Google Play.
Text messaging by texting “OUT” to 69678 (myORU) or
Call 1-877-434-4100.

For safety’s sake, don’t touch or approach any downed wire. Assume it is energized and dangerous. Call O&R immediately toll-free 1-877-434-4100. Depending on the situation, you may also want to call your local police to divert traffic until an O&R crew arrives.

To help its customers prepare to weather a storm, O&R offers these tips:

For safety’s sake, don’t touch or approach any downed wire. Assume it is energized and dangerous. Call O&R immediately toll-free 1-877-434-4100. Depending on the situation, you may also want to call your local police to divert traffic until an O&R crew arrives.
Maintain a distance of at least 50 feet from downed wires and anything they are in contact with including puddles of water and fences.
Supervise your children so that they are not in the vicinity and keep pets on a leash or otherwise secure.
If a fallen wire is draped over a car, do not approach the car and make rescue attempts. Remain a safe distance away and try to keep the occupant of the vehicle calm. If possible, emergency personnel should handle the situation.
Pole-top transformers --- those small grey-colored metal drums attached to the wires at the tops of most utility poles --- also should be avoided when they have been knocked to the ground.
Portable generators pose a serious hazard if used improperly. They should be used and installed according to the manufacturer’s instructions. A wrong connection could feed electricity back through the lines and endanger our repair crews. Never plug a generator into a wall unit, use it indoors or set it up outdoors near open home windows or air-handling vents.
Have emergency equipment within reach --- portable radio, flashlights, spare batteries, first aid kit, cell phone and important medications. Keep O&R’s toll-free number 1-877-434-4100 near the phone to report power outages.
Remember: if the base station of your cordless phone plugs into the wall, your phone will be unusable during a power outage.

About Orange & Rockland

Orange and Rockland Utilities, Inc. (O&R), a wholly owned subsidiary of Consolidated Edison, Inc., one of the nation’s largest investor-owned energy companies, is a regulated utility. O&R provides electric service to approximately 300,000 customers in southeastern New York State (where its franchise name is Orange & Rockland) and northern New Jersey (where it’s Rockland Electric Company) and natural gas service to approximately 130,000 customers in New York.

O&R serves all of Rockland, and parts of Orange and Sullivan counties in New York and, through its wholly owned subsidiary Rockland Electric Company, O&R serves parts of Bergen, Passaic and Sussex counties in New Jersey.

O&R serves the following communities in New York: Airmont, Bloomingburg, Blooming Grove, Chester Town, Chester Village, Chestnut Ridge, Clarkstown, Crawford, Deerpark, Florida, Forestburgh, Goshen Town, Goshen Village, Grand View, Greenwood Lake, Greenville, Harriman, Haverstraw Town, Haverstraw Village, Highland Falls, Highlands, Hillburn, Kaser, Kiryas Joel, Lumberland, Mamakating, Middletown, Minisink, Monroe Town, Monroe Village, Montebello, Mount Hope, New Hempstead, New Square, Nyack, Orangetown, Otisville, Palm Tree, Piermont, Pomona, Port Jervis, Ramapo, Sloatsburg, South Blooming Grove, South Nyack, Spring Valley, Stony Point, Suffern, Tuxedo Town, Tuxedo Park, Unionville, Upper Nyack, Wesley Hills, Wallkill, Warwick Town, Warwick Village, Washingtonville, Wawayanda, West Haverstraw, Woodbury, Woodbury Village, Wurtsboro.

O&R, as Rockland Electric Company, serves the following communities in New Jersey: Allendale, Alpine, Closter, Cresskill, Demarest, Franklin Lakes, Harrington Park, Mahwah, Haworth (part), Montague, Montvale, Northvale, Norwood, Oakland, Old Tappan (part), Ramsey, Ringwood, Rivervale (part), Rockleigh, Saddle River (part), Upper Saddle River, Wantage (part), Vernon (part), West Milford (part), Wyckoff (part).