Renton residents relieved to have power restored despite frustrations with PSE

Crews with multiple utilities — including the Snohomish County Public Utility District (Snohomish PUD) and Puget Sound Energy (PSE) — are continuing to deal with tens of thousands of power outages Sunday, days after an “atmospheric bomb” weather event pummeled Western Washington.

As of 5:00 p.m. Monday, 6,540 customers in Washington remain affected by power outages, the website poweroutage.us confirmed. Less than two days ago, at 11 a.m. Saturday, 92,428 customers were impacted by power outages. At 3:45 p.m. Friday, that number stood at 138,532 outages.

Those numbers are all improvements over the 185,245 customers impacted as of 6 a.m. Friday. There were 328,464 homes and businesses impacted as of 6:20 a.m. Thursday. There were 578,000 customers impacted as of 5:15 a.m. Wednesday. The outage number topped 650,000 during its peak.

Cliff Mass on the recent ‘bomb cyclone’: ‘Atmospheric bomb revved up very rapidly’

The PSE outage map is reporting 301 outages and 6,246 homes and businesses across multiple areas of Western Washington are without power as of about 5:00 p.m. Monday. At approximately 11 a.m. Saturday, there were 1,044 outages affecting 83,433 customers affected. There were 1,264 outages and 125,775 customers were without power as of 3:45 p.m. Friday. That is compared to 1,241 outages and 166,672 customers not having power as of 6:10 a.m. Friday.

In a statement on its website early Sunday, the utility called out specific service areas that were still seeing significant outages and issues.

Looking at Issaquah and the surrounding area, PSE reported “tree failures” and “extensive damage to poles, arms and twisted wire. ” But it expects “significant progress” Sunday.

The utility also noted “Hobart/Maple Valley is one of the hardest hit areas from the windstorm and reported that it “will require a great deal of work and will take some time, but the crews are giving it their all to restore power to the area.”

In a separate statement published Saturday morning, PSE cited the progress it made to restore power to all customers but acknowledged the times customers would get their power back had to be pushed.

“While we’re making progress, the substantial amount of damage we are encountering from the storm’s hurricane-force winds has made our work slower than expected, and we had to push back estimated restoration times for customers (Friday) evening,” the statement reads. “We know that you are disappointed to be without power for this extended period. We appreciate your patience …”

Eastside residents grateful to get power back after multi-day outage

Most residents in the East Renton Highlands had their power restored Monday, nearly six full days after a series of massive trees fell in the wooded neighborhoods, some on power lines.

This is the one of the trees that’s caused a nearly week-long power outage for residents in the East Renton Highlands.

Neighbors here are getting frustrated; they tell me restoration estimates have been pushed back again — one man says PSE told him tomorrow morning. pic.twitter.com/IN0N81etz3

— Sam Campbell (@HeySamCampbell) November 25, 2024

Neighbors told KIRO Newsradio the utility company had previously estimated it could restore power by Saturday before pushing back to Sunday, then again to Monday morning and once more before lights ultimately came back on by the late afternoon.

Drew Loika said his power came back around 3:30 p.m.

“Power went out Tuesday night,” he said. “I ran over to Grandma and Grandpa’s house, figured it was going to be a few days. Turned out to be more than a few days. I’ve been camping in the living room.”

Another couple in the neighborhood, Pete and Hannelore Moss, were happy to have a backup generator, but said it couldn’t handle heating their water.

“We went to the Issaquah pool to take showers,” Hannelore Moss shared.

“Our water heater’s electric — it’s not gas,” Pete Moss added.

Loika said he’s grateful for the linemen crews, but he grew frustrated with conflicting, and often quickly changing, information from PSE.

Corinne, who provided just her first name, said she was also growing weary of communication from the energy provider.

“Nothing specific, always different days, different times and never following through,” she said.

Pete Moss issued a message of gratitude for the linemen crews, some who came from out of state, and others who told KIRO Newsradio they worked 120-hour weeks.

“Thank you,” he said about the workers. “You had half a million out, and now it’s down to a handful.”

“We’re lucky,” Hannelore Moss said. “We’re not complaining.”

Timeline of power outages through Puget Sound Energy

Going back further, at 6:25 a.m. Thursday, there were 1,049 outages and 285,092 PSE customers without power. As of 5:15 a.m. Wednesday, 1,649 outages and 414,552 customers not having power were reported.

Early Wednesday, PSE reported 474,032 customers were without power as of 1 a.m. Wednesday.

On Friday, PSE also explained that it has been having some issues with its outage map and the precise numbers may not be accurate.

“We are aware of an issue with our outage map, the utility stated on its website. “It is not reflecting all of the customers whose power has been restored, and is not showing a set of customers who are still without power.”

An earlier statement from the utility reads that crews in King County have said, “the damage is comparable to the worst storms of past decades.”

During an appearance on KIRO Newsradio’s “The Gee and Ursula Show” last Wednesday morning, PSE spokesperson Melanie Coon said there was a lot to clean up.

“Just massive devastation,” she said. “We have a lot of damage we’re assessing this morning.”

The PSE spokesperson went on to note that since the winds blew in from the east, it made it easier to knock down trees.

“Most of the winds we usually get are from the west and trees are used to the wind coming from that direction,” Coon said. “When you have wind coming from the other direction, they’re not really rooted in a way to resist that.”

Power outages in Snohomish County, Washington and beyond

According to the Snohomish PUD outage map, 1,088 customers still don’t have power as of 7 a.m. Monday. That’s down from the 7,252 customers in the area who were without power as of about 11 a.m. Saturday. As of 3:45 p.m. Friday, 10,207 customers were without power and 13,880 homes and businesses affected were affected as of 5:45 a.m. Friday. Early Thursday, 29,642 customers in the area did not have power. Going back further, on Wednesday, 75,420 customers in the area were without power and 113,129 customers in the area were affected as of 2:30 a.m. Wednesday.

In a statement on its website Saturday morning, Snohomish PUD explained the last stage of work won’t move as fast.

“The remaining work will move at a slower pace as we make complex repairs that impact fewer customers,” the utility reported online. “We anticipate a majority of existing outages will be restored by the end of day Sunday, but some outages in severely damaged areas will linger into early next week.”

Previously, Snohomish PUD stated that many of the remaining outages involve “replacing multiple poles, hiking into remote areas, or have extensive damage.”

Meanwhile, Seattle City Light reported 2 “active events” and 197 customers affected by the power outages at 7 a.m. Monday. That’s down from 111 “active events” and 1,226 homes and businesses impacted at 11 a.m. Saturday. The utility stated there were 236 “active events” and 2,532 customers affected at 3:45 p.m. Friday.

Going back further, Seattle City Light reported 183 “active events” and 4,292 customers affected by the power outages at 6:15 a.m. Friday. Around that same time Thursday morning, there were 526 “active events” and 10,624 customers affected by the power outages.

There were 104,449 outages as of 2 a.m. Wednesday. The Seattle City Light outage map was down for some time on Wednesday and was not producing accurate numbers.

Tacoma Public Utilities’ outage map shows no outages as of 10 a.m. Sunday. The utility hasn’t showed any significant outages since Thursday. As of Wednesday afternoon, seven outages and 55 customers were affected, mostly south of Tacoma. As of 6:15 a.m., 20 outages were reported and 186 customers were affected as of 5:15 a.m. At around 2:30 a.m., 962 homes and businesses were dealing with outages.

This remains a developing story. Check back for updates.

Editors’ note: This story was originally published on Tuesday, Nov. 19. It has been updated and republished multiple times since then.

Contributing: Sam Campbell, KIRO Newsradio

Steve Coogan is the lead editor of MyNorthwest. You can read more of his stories here. Follow Steve on X, or email him here.