Power fails in Goessel, Lehigh

Flint Hills Electric Coop blames Evergy

By PHYLLIS ZORN

Staff writer

An equipment failure at an Evergy substation that serves Goessel and Lehigh left both towns without power early Monday.

A warming station was arranged in Goessel, fire chief Matt Voth said, but no one needed to use it.

Flint Hills Electric Cooperative member services manager Travis Griffin said power failed at 4:30 a.m. After linemen performed switching at the substation, power was restored two hours later.

A week earlier, problems with Evergy’s transmission lines made power fail throughout most of the rural areas of the county and portions of Dickinson County, he said.

“When the storm hit Monday night into Tuesday, our biggest problem was galloping lines,” Griffin said. “When lines gallop, they slap, and a fuse blows.”

Durham, Goessel, and Lehigh substations were out of power 14 hours, from midnight until 2 p.m. Jan. 9.

Getting to the substations with roads drifted over was a problem, Griffin said.

“We fought stuck trucks all day, and thankfully the famers where able to get them out,” he said. “We take these things very seriously, and we are very concerned about it.”

Griffin said the company was aware that its concern for keeping electricity flowing didn’t ease the pain when power is interrupted.

“We’re not happy, and we’re working with Evergy on the problem,” he said. “We’re doing things for those substations to hopefully mitigate those things in the future.”