LIGHTS FLICKER ACROSS CITY AFTER EARTHMOVER SNAPS UTILITY POLE; POWER CUT OFF TO 500 CUSTOMERS

The lights flickered for only about a second through much of Cape Girardeau early Wednesday afternoon after an earthmover struck a 55-foot-high utility pole on North Sprigg Street Road near Cape Rock Village.

But others weren't so lucky. About 500 Union Electric customers in the Cape Rock Village area were without power much of the afternoon and early evening while the current was turned off and the pole was replaced.

The Missouri Highway Patrol said the accident occurred at 1:25 p.m. when a pickup truck driven by Christopher Vick, 16, of Tamms, Ill., pulled out into the path of the oncoming earthmover as it was traveling north on Old Sprigg Street Road, at the intersection of Sunny Lane in Cape Rock Village.

Vick was cited by the patrol for failure to yield.

No one was injured, but the operator of the earthmover, Larry Kiehne of Millersville, said it was a close call. "I think I aged about two years when I heard that pole cracking," Kiehne told a reporter later. "I sat there for a while to make sure none of the power lines had dropped onto the earthmover and then I jumped off."

The earthmover is owned by Kelley Construction Co. of Cape Girardeau. It had only minor damage.

Union Electric Company officials said the pole snapped in two places, but the top half remained suspended upright, held by the high voltage power lines. The bottom of the top half of the fractured pole was balanced precariously on one of the earthmover's large tires.

"If there had been any wind at all out there, the rest of the pole and the hot lines would have come down on top of the earthmover," said one Union Electric employee.

When the pole snapped, high voltage lines of a 34,500-volt distribution circuit on top of the pole touched for an instant, resulting in the momentary power outage. The momentary outage caused lights to flicker, air conditioners to shut down, and computer screens to go dark in much of the city.

Power to the high voltage line, which feeds the nearby North Rural substation, was shut off about 30 to 45 minutes after the accident so the pole could be replaced, UE officials said. The substation is along North Sprigg Street Road, west of Cape Rock Village. It has three 12,500-volt circuits. One extends from the substation, out Cape Rock Drive and Highway 177, toward Egypt Mills.

Another circuit extends south along Cape Rock Drive to Perryville Road, and east on Bertling.

The third circuit runs north along North Sprigg Street Road to Bainbridge Road where it splits and runs east and west. One line extends along Oriole Road where it feeds transmitters for two local TV stations and several radio stations.

A Union Electric spokesman said they were able to pick up a part of Oriole Road service to the television transmitters from the Glennwood substation on Route W near the Jaycee Municipal Golf Course. However, power in Cape Rock Village and along Highway 177 toward Egypt Mills could not be restored because there is no other substation in that area.

"We could have bypassed the North Rural substation and fed Cape Rock Village from another substation, but the switch that isolates the Cape Rock Village from the Egypt Mills circuit was located on the fractured pole, and we couldn't get to it," a UE official said.

Most of the affected customers live in Cape Rock Village. The rest live along Cape Rock Drive and Highway 177 toward Egypt Mills.

UE officials said Wednesday that it would take several hours to mount all of the hardware on the utility pole, set the pole in the ground, and move the electrical lines to the new pole.