High winds brought power outages to South Anchorage and Hillside Saturday

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) - Wind gusts as high as 79 mph caused numerous power outages throughout Anchorage on Saturday, mainly across South Anchorage and the adjacent Hillside.

By mid-afternoon the number of outages had reached its peak of nearly 1,300 customers (assuming an average household of 4 people, that’s roughly 2,200 people with out power), according to the outage map from Chugach Electric. Chugach Electric Senior Manager of Corporate Communications Julie Hasquet said that crews were actively working to restore power.

“Because there’s so many small outages right now, it’s hard to give a time of restoration. I just like to tell people to let Chugach crews work as safely and quickly as they can, and we don’t go home till everybody’s power is restored,” Hasquet said. “If there is any kind of a hazard or a downed line, please stay away from those. We don’t want anyone to ever approach a downed power line. And if you call 762-7888. That is our outage line.”

As of 9:30 a.m. Sunday, 172 customers were still without power.

Chugach Electric posted on Twitter around 6:30 a.m on Sunday that there was an outage impacting 145 members located south of West Klatt Road and Timberlane Drive. A crew was on the way shortly before 8:00 a.m.

The National Weather Service in Anchorage has issued a High Wind Warning for the Anchorage Municipality, but with a focus on the Anchorage Hillside and Turnagain Arm for winds sustained from 40-50 mph with gusts as high as 65 mph throughout the day. This warning was canceled just before 10 p.m. Saturday.

Hasquet still reminds customers ”I always recommend people get their emergency supplies out: candles, flashlights, blankets, extra dog food, whatever you might need if you had an extended outage. But the good thing is it’s not all that cold today. So hopefully people will just hunker down and wait for the power to come back on.”

This article has been updated with new information.

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