John Ruch
A recent series of power outages that lasted eight to 10 hours each left about 500 households along Washington Street in the dark and cold.
“The problem began with a failure in a piece of underground cable,” NSTAR spokesperson Michael Durand told the Gazette. “Unfortunately, due to the nature of this particular cable failure, it was extremely difficult to locate.”
The cable originally failed on the morning of Jan. 23, causing an outage more than seven hours long in the Brookside and Parkside neighborhoods along Washington Street.
Two more long outages followed on Jan. 24 and 28 as NSTAR shut off the power to search for the problem, according to Durand. Between the outages, NSTAR had two generators powering the area.
Another 10-hour outage was required on Feb. 4 to replace five sections of cable and install a new transformer, Durand said. One Forest Hills Street resident told the Gazette that the temperature in her house dropped below 50 degrees due to that outage.
Durand said the problem is now fixed and that NSTAR will be monitoring the area closely to make sure it stays that way.