By Rob Cone-Clark
Turnagain Times Correspondent
The community of Whittier lost electrical service Friday, Nov. 14 from noon until just after 3 p.m. The outage caused the shutdown of the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel and a delay unloading the Alaska State Ferry Aurora. The city’s back-up generation systems were fired up to keep electricity flowing to residential and municipal buildings.
Chugach Electric Spokesperson Patti Bogan said repairmen were sent from Anchorage.
“A line had tripped and so we dispatched crew,” Bogan said. “They patrolled the line, they didn’t find an issue, they closed it (the circuit) and it held. We don’t have a concrete cause for what happened. It was snowing, so the assumption is there could have been some snow that had loaded up on the lines and then when it fell off the lines slapped together. It could have been tree branches, but they didn’t find any evidence of that. So, it is just kind of one of the unknowns that happens now and again.”
At the Whittier Tunnel, operators stopped all general traffic, citing safety concerns.
“The problem we’ve got is the tunnel was designed to use ventilation while we are flowing traffic,” said Facilities Manager Gordon Burton. “With the power out we do not have enough electricity with our backup generators to operate our jet fans or our portal fans. So, were we to have a fire, we wouldn’t have any way of ventilating.”
Burton said essential emergency traffic is allowed to transit the tunnel and that the Alaska Department of Transportation 2010 capital projects budget includes a request to purchase backup generators capable of running all the tunnel’s fans.
The State Ferry Aurora arrived at the Whittier Ferry Terminal at 1:45 p.m. Although the terminal has back-up generators, and the ship’s docking was uneventful, the terminal operators were unable to adjust an electrically actuated draw bridge like ramp. The operators could be overheard discussing a circuit breaker popping each time the ramp controls were engaged. The ramp is used to compensate for the fluctuating tide, and is required to unload a ferry.
“Our generators and circuits have always been sufficient for this level of load,” said Terminal Manager Mary Brenneman. “The problem seems to be in some recently installed computers.”
Marine Highway employees worked to fix the problem until the grid power was reconnected and operations returned to normal.
Elsewhere around Whittier, diesel generators kicked in. The 198 unit Begich Towers, the 100 unit Whittier Manor, the Whittier School, the Whittier Small Boat Harbor and the Public Works building all rely on emergency generators during the not uncommon local winter power outages.