Peabody area has long power outage

Residents of Peabody and the surrounding area were left in the dark Thursday night after experiencing a power failure that affected more than 500 customers and two long-term care facilities.

The failure that began around 4 p.m. was finally resolved around 7:30 p.m., county emergency manager Randy Frank said.

Westar said the outage was caused by extreme winds. The National Weather Service in Wichita had issued a “red flag” wind warning that day for Marion and surrounding counties.

“The entire city was blacked out, shutting down all activities in the schools, and the business district was closed,” Frank said. “We quickly assessed the immediate health care needs in both of the long term care facilities and the general safety of the community.”

Frank worked with both care facilities to make sure all necessary steps were being taken to ensure that their patrons’ health and safety remained intact, including preparing generators in case of an all night outage. Sheriff deputies were prepared to respond with a generator.