MAY 17 STORM PLAYED HAVOC WITH UTILITIES

Troubleshooters, field and line, tree-cutting and light-repair crews worked many hours to restore power to Cape Girardeau and the area following the May 17 windstorm.

About 90 percent of customers served by AmerenUE in the Cape Girardeau area were affected in some way by the storm, which uprooted trees, downed power lines and left many homes and businesses without power.

"An hour after the storm passed through a wide area of Cape Girardeau and vicinity, our computers showed about 27,000 people without power," said Doug Groesbeck, district manager for AmerenUE, which serves about 30,000 customers from Cape Girardeau.

For some, power was off only a few minutes, for others it was off from 12 to 48 hours, and for a very few it was off an agonizing 90 hours.

AmerenUE, Falcon Cable TV, city public works crews and telephone repairmen were busy for hours and days following the storm that brought wind of 60 to 90 mph.

AmerenUE used full crews of as many as 200 people working around the clock. "We had 42 crews of linemen out," said Groesbeck.

Among other workers were 18 to 20 crews from Shade Tree Co., who cut limbs and trees away from power lines.

"A lot of the work involved clearing trees away," said Groesbeck.

More than 200 workers and troubleshooters were out at various times. Crews were here from Jefferson County, East St. Louis, Ill., St. Louis County, Franklin County, Dexter, Charleston and Hayti.

"We also had some outside contractor crews working in the general vicinity," he said.

At one time it was reported that 44,000 customers were without power, but many of the calls were repeat calls, and that is why the high number was reported. Actually, AmerenUE serves only about 30,000 customers in the district.

Trees and limbs are still being picked up by Cape Girardeau Public Works Department.

"It'll take us another three weeks to get the job done," said Tim Gramling of the Public Works Department. "There are a lot of limbs out there. Some areas were hit worse than others."

Gramling urges residents to get the limbs to the curb. "Don't place them in the streets," said Gramling. "This has caused some traffic tie-ups."

Complaints of telephone service were fewer in the area following the storm.

"We had about 2,000 reports of telephone outages," said Brian Westrich of Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. "Most of the outages were taken care of within a couple of hours as auxiliary power kicked in.

The remainder of the phone outages were taken care of within 24 hours of the calls. Some people didn't report telephone outages until late Tuesday and Wednesday.

Cable television customers had to wait until electrical power was restored to check their cable service. Falcon Cable TV crews worked around the clock to restore service as power was restored.

"We replaced a full mile of cable," said Roger Harms of Falcon. "We had to replace between 200 and 300 dropped cables at various locations around town." "We're at 100 percent now," Harms said Thursday.

Project Impact, a Cape Girardeau program designed to prevent and reduce disaster damages, was not a primary player in the cleanup.

"We'll conduct a meeting next month for a briefing session about the storm," said Walter Denton, assistant city manager. He is currently coordinating the Project Impact program.

The wastewater treatment plant was down about 40 hours.

"A grant generated by Project Impact will be used to install a backup generator at the plant," said Denton. "Design and engineering of the generator is already under way.

Power story

AmerenUE's record of power restoration after the May 17 windstorm.

-- Six hours: Power restored to 41 percent of homes or about 11,000 customers.

-- 12 hours: 56 percent restored.

-- 24 hours; 82 percent restored.

-- 36 hours: 89 percent restored.

-- 48 hours: 94 percent restored, leaving about 100 customers without power.

-- 90 hours: All power restored by 10 a.m. May 21.