From Worthington Public Utilities General Manager Scott Hain at 5:30 p.m. Thursday:
No progress has been made as of yet on the repair of the damaged electric transmission lines that normally provide power to Worthington. Through the night and into at least tomorrow, Worthington Public Utilities will continue to provide power to our customers using our 14 megawatts of local generation.
Rolling blackouts are likely to continue into the evening, but as the demand for electricity drops off later tonight we may reach a point where our generating capacity can satisfy the needs of our customers and the blackouts will cease. As the demand for power increases during the morning hours, rolling blackouts will resume as necessary. Any necessary switching will occur at the top of the hour and we will continue to attempt to limit the duration of the periods without power to no more than one hour.
Word was received late this afternoon that crews from Great River Energy are on their way to repair the damage. We are hopeful that repairs go smoothly and that we might possibly regain use of at least one of our transmission lines by sometime tomorrow. When that happens it is anticipated that we will be able to suspend rolling blackouts.
