Welch Island Power

[Descant]

To my knowledge, Ishoot308, Slickcraft an Welch-time are all on the north Welch power circuit. Anybody on the south circuit to confirm power is on?
We had an instance several years ago where power came to part of the south circuit, but not all. PSNH sent out a 2 man crew with an extension pole. They reset a breaker on a pole transformer, and we were back on. Didn't seem to affect others way down the line, but we didn't know who was home to report.

TV news this am (11/5) reported that Eversource says 100% of customers are receiving service. If my main breaker is tripped to shut off for the winter, can they tell? Or do they just go by reports from customers?

[welch-time]

I'm pretty sure Eversource can detect outages to individual houses that are equipped with new "smart meters". These are the meters with the digital display. I noticed Eversource installed one at our house last spring. My guess is the whole island has them now. The meters communicate back to the mothership via cell phone signals so the meters don't have to be read manually by a person on foot (really handy for an island). If a meter fails to send a signal the power company knows there's an outage at a specific location. I imagine they have devices mounted on poles as well to verify entire circuit status.

And just to reiterate, many thanks to the people who repair this stuff after a storm. I have huge respect for these people. I can't imagine working in the woods near lethal voltages in the rain while climbing ladders with chain-saws and other dangerous activities without quick access to medical help. I fully expected the island electric service repairs to be a lower priority than on the mainland after a major storm like we had. I get it. We're a bunch of summer cottages on an island, mostly closed for the winter. It's the reason I have a generator.

So maybe after all the smoke has cleared, a phone call to Eversource might be in order to thank the repair crews.
Mark

[Little Bear]

Power is back at my place on Little Bear Island.

[Descant]

Originally Posted by welch-time

I'm pretty sure Eversource can detect outages to individual houses that are equipped with new "smart meters". These are the meters with the digital display. I noticed Eversource installed one at our house last spring. My guess is the whole island has them now. The meters communicate back to the mothership via cell phone signals so the meters don't have to be read manually by a person on foot (really handy for an island). If a meter fails to send a signal the power company knows there's an outage at a specific location. I imagine they have devices mounted on poles as well to verify entire circuit status.

And just to reiterate, many thanks to the people who repair this stuff after a storm. I have huge respect for these people. I can't imagine working in the woods near lethal voltages in the rain while climbing ladders with chain-saws and other dangerous activities without quick access to medical help. I fully expected the island electric service repairs to be a lower priority than on the mainland after a major storm like we had. I get it. We're a bunch of summer cottages on an island, mostly closed for the winter. It's the reason I have a generator.

So maybe after all the smoke has cleared, a phone call to Eversource might be in order to thank the repair crews.
Mark

Good info. Thank you. And yes, thank you to the line crews.