News > CEO’s Message – September 2024

CEO’s Message – September 2024

Sayonara Summer Storms: An Update on Major Outage Events

As summer ends, we at Stearns Electric hope storm season does too. After avoiding significant damage and major outages within our service territory last summer, Stearns Electric faced three major outage events due to storms this summer. 

JUNE 12 

Severe weather caused outages for 1,151 members on June 12. The largest outage lasted 5 hours and 46 minutes due to a shed that blew over and took out one of our feeders at our Fischer Hill substation, impacting 650 members. 

Unfortunately, even more members were out of power during this time due to an underground cable hit by a contractor just before the storms rolled through. 

JULY 13-14 

With this storm, outage calls began late Saturday, July 13 and continued into Sunday. Many members returned home from a weekend away to find trees in power lines. The hardest hit areas were around Big Swan Lake and north of St. Joseph. Storms left 1,760 members without power and broke six poles. A total of 68 total outages needed to be restored. 

Many employees reported to work on Sunday, July 14 to help with restoration efforts. I want to thank all our Stearns Electric employees who answered phones, dispatched crews, prepared and delivered meals to crews, worked to restore outages, responded to member inquiries and more. 

I also want to thank Runestone Electric for sending some of their linemen to help us with restoration efforts. 

AUGUST 3 

After celebrating members at our Member Appreciation Pancake Feed earlier in the day, the evening turned busy for our Cooperative. Severe weather, strong winds and even a tornado impacted our service territory, causing outages for 1,231 members and breaking 17 poles. There were 70 different outages that needed to be restored from this storm. 

Outages began at 7:28 p.m. on Saturday, August 3, and our crews restored power to the last impacted member at 8:20 p.m. on Sunday, August 4. Considering the widespread damage these storms caused, restoring all members by sundown on Sunday was a tremendous accomplishment. 

Again, I want to thank all the employees who had a hand in restoration efforts. We had 28 field employees (13 crews) repairing and patrolling lines during and after storms went through, and additional employees who dispatched crews, organized meal prep and delivery, took phone calls and managed outage updates. 

Providing reliable electricity is a top priority for Stearns Electric and I understand how frustrating losing power to your residence, farm or business can be. I am, however, quite pleased that despite the severe weather, considerable damage to our system, and significant number of outages, members who lost power on average had their lights back on in just over 7 hours. Restoring outages is a team effort, and I’m grateful to lead the dedicated Stearns Electric team who serves you, our members. 

Sincerely,

Matt O’Shea
Chief Executive Officer