The cause of a power outage in Fayette County that began around 2:30 p.m. Monday and left 3,870 residents in the dark has not yet been explained by Dayton Power and Light Company.
Crews with DP&L began investigating shortly after calls started coming in from customers in the villages of Jeffersonville and Octa.
With some luck, crews were able to re-route electric service to some customers. By 3:35 p.m., however, there were still 2,456 households without power.
Mike with Hixon Towing responded to a call from a woman parked at the Tanger Outlet Mall in Jeffersonville during the power outage. Hixon brought gasoline and filled her Mercedes in the parking lot. Stores were empty, with many of them hanging handwritten signs on the doors instructing that they were closed due to the power outage.
At 4:30 p.m., Jeff Detty at Detty’s Market in Jeffersonville was working to hook up a second cash register to a generator. A few customers were coming in the store purchasing chips, sour candy, cigarettes and beer.
The coolers and freezers were locked down tight and the foods stored in them would be safe for three to four hours, said Detty. He didn’t have a generator powerful enough to hook up to the coolers and freezers. After that, “I’ll be bringing in a dumpster,” he said.
Samantha Smith, 20, lives on Maple Street in Jeffersonville, and had just returned home from her job at Walmart in Washington C.H.
With five weeks to go in her pregnancy, Smith said she was worried about the power outage. “If anything happens, if my phone dies, I’m out of luck,” she said.
As Smith looked at her phone, she said her fiance works in Athens. “It has about 50 percent battery right now.”
At 5 p.m., Sharon Russell, 71, sat in her van down the street and charged her cell phone. She said she didn’t like the power outage. The sun was beginning to set, and Russell said her husband uses an oxygen tank at night.
“We have a backup tank that goes for four hours,” said Russell, “and does not have to be plugged in like the regular one.”
With all that is happening in the world today, Russell said, “It’s dangerous anymore when the power’s out.”
As of 7:25 p.m. Monday, a spokesperson with DP&L said power had been restored to all customers. The spokesperson said there was no update on what caused the power outage, only that crews had been called in for repairs.