JANUARY 17, 01:22 EST

Power Outages in Pacific Northwest

By MIKE WELLS Associated Press Writer

Gale-force winds whistled from the south through Oregon, downing trees across highways AP/Beth Buglione [25K] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SEATTLE (AP)  A fierce windstorm swept through the Pacific Northwest on Sunday, killing two people in Washington state and leaving hundreds of thousands of customers without power.

Hien Nguyen, 19, of Lacey, was killed around noon when a 120-foot fir tree blew down on his pickup truck, crushing the cab, Lt. Matt Koehler said.

A 50-year-old Seattle architect died in an avalanche at the Crystal Mountain ski resort, about 65 miles southeast of Seattle near Mt. Rainier. He and another skier had hiked into a closed area when the avalanche struck at about 1:30 p.m. His identity was not released.

Interstate 90, running between Seattle and Spokane, was shut down periodically Sunday as crews set smaller avalanches to remove the danger of large ones sweeping down onto the roadway, said Clarissa Lundeen, spokeswoman for the state Department of Transportation.

Wind-blown waves crash onto the I-90 bridge AP/Elaine Thompson [26K] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ``The snow that has already fallen is being weighted down by rain and wet snow'' creating high danger of avalanches, she said.

Interstate 90, running between Seattle and Spokane, was shut down periodically Sunday as crews set smaller avalanches to remove the danger of large ones sweeping down onto the roadway, Lundeen said.

Blown-down trees and limbs caused most of the power outages, utility officials said.

The weather service reported sustained winds of 25 to 35 miles per hour. The highest gusts reported by the National Weather Service were 115 mph at midmorning at Cannon Beach, Ore. Gusts of 81 mph at Netarts, Ore., knocked a house 12 feet off of its foundation.

Some 5,000 Seattle City Light customers remained without power in the greater Seattle area late Sunday evening  down from a high of 36,000.

There were about 300,000 customers without power in western Washington and about 100,000 in the dark in western Orgeon.

The winds forced the precautionary closure of the floating bridge linking Seattle and its eastern suburbs. An estimated 100,000 cars use the 520 bridge each day. The outage left the Interstate 90 floating bridge, three miles to the south, as the only cross-lake span.

Puget Sound Energy spokeswoman Kremiere Boone said that most of the people living the Olympia, Puyallup and Enumclaw areas were without power.

] http://wire.ap.org/?SLUG=STATE%2dDEPARTMENT%2dSECURITY

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-- boop (leafyspurge@hotmail.com), January 17, 2000

Answers

Mm hmm yep...this is definitely y2k related. Definitely

-- Cin (Cinlooo@aol.com), January 17, 2000.

Cin,

Maybe not y2k related, but an excellent argument for holding onto one's preps.

On a heap-o-rice,

Frank

-- Someone (ChimingIn@twocents.com), January 17, 2000.

Cin, as has been pointed out by many on this forum ever since I've been here (over a year posting and another 7 months lurking):

IT'S NOT JUST Y2K.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), January 17, 2000.

You are right Git. I feel so justified now for having cashed in my 401K fund, relocating, urging everyone I know to pull all of their money out of the bank, quitting my job, and maxxing out all of my credit cards (for y2k supplies). Yep, the power going out for a few hours in Seattle proves I was right all along.

-- Butt Nugget (catsbutt@umailme.com), January 17, 2000.

and how many people actually did that, nugget, you idiot?

-- (-@#-.-), January 17, 2000.

See earlier post (Carl?) re failed offshore buoys, therefore ability to predict, characterize storm significantly impaired...

-- james hyde (hydesci@gte.net), January 17, 2000.

Some people have called me a "polly". I have always said I was prepared long before Y2k became a public issue. Power went out, having those little disposable flashlights (you have to hold the button down to get it to work, so they cannot be left on to run the battery out) that are placed by every bed, one under the end of the couch (yep to reach in the dark without moving) Got fat candle from the top of the entertainment center for the living room, latern "flashlight" was on the dresser in the bedroom was used for reading by the little one, and drawing by the older "little one", walked through the kitchen and got the table candle off of the top of the refrigerator, walked to the towel shelf for the little heart shaped "light the way" candles to place in bathrooms and on safe areas (do not put one on a counter under a kitchen cupboard-fire hazzard) turned off the surge protected power strips to the computers, decided on munchies and drinks and set them out to be used as needed, got out my transister TV (had it for 8 years-radioshack, liquid crystal around $100.00 ), to be used if info was needed or if the power was still out when the X-files came on, Called Seattle utilities to listen to the recording of all of the outages, they give the outage bounderies, cause and estimated time until repaired ((cause-unknown time 36 hours max))Called in the cat, opened the windows a bit to feel the wind and hear the storm, made the required phone calls to check on Dad (he still had power) and otherpeople who might need help, and kicked back with my feet up. Everything was perfectly calm and everyone was relaxed and content.

Then the damn power came back on and ruined the mood. There is always hope another tree will fall and power will go back out, before the fat lady sings.

Took a drive around to see the damage, LOTS of tree's and limbs had knocked out power lines, intersections with the lights out were being used as four way stops, some lights at intersections had been blown so hard by the wind that even when the lights worked they were turned around in the wrong direction.

About half of the power was out, the other half on, stores and businesses were using their back-up generators, and you could see the odd house here and there on dark streets with lights. Kinda got a feel for who preped with generators. No angry mobs heading for those lit houses either. I'll bet those who had bought generators and were thinking of getting rid of them changed their minds after last night. It never hurts to be prepared for a three day storm.

-- Cherri (sams@brigadoon.com), January 17, 2000.