Energy officials: Residents should expect power outages

01:24 PM CDT on Thursday, September 22, 2005

KVUE News

One of the biggest concerns across Central Texas has been keeping power flowing during the storm.

Wednesday, officials at Austin Energy put all crews on standby and talked with utility companies across the state to make sure help would be available if there were major outages.

Austin Energy says it trims trees year-round to try and minimize damage from storms such as Rita, but the company says there is little doubt there will be outages if Central Texas gets tropical storm force winds.

"Wind is probably the most detrimental element of nature, because it blows power lines against trees, tree limbs against equipment, breaks tree limbs and that sort of thing, so if we have significantly high winds, the chances of us having a high number of outages is probably pretty good," said Ed Clark, Austin Energy.

Austin Energy asks that every power outage be called in to help officials pinpoint specific problems.

If you lose power from Austin Energy, call 322-9100 to report the outage.