Widespread power outages and a 'multiple-day restoration effort'

This morning's ice storm is causing historic damage to power lines across the region in what is fast becoming Peco Energy Co.'s worst winter storm ever - one that may leave some electricity customers without power into the weekend.

More than 600,000 Peco customers were without service today as trees freighted with weekend snow glazed by a coating of fresh ice toppled into power lines. About 750,000 customers in Pennsylvania were without power, Gov. Corbett said in a news briefing.

New Jersey utilities reported lighter damage. Public Service Electric & Gas Co. reported that 40,000 of its 2.2 million customers were out, mostly in Burlington and Mercer Counties. Atlantic City Electric Co. reported about 2,000 customers out.

Peco's suburban customers appear to have taken the worst. About 181,000, or 84 percent, of Chester County customers were out of service. More than 60 percent of customers in Bucks and Montgomery Counties were blacked out.

With the number rising as heavy snow and caked-on ice pull down tree limbs and wires, 3,000 workers, including contractors, are feverishly trying to restore power across the region, said Peco spokeswoman Cathy Engel Menendez.

Peco put out a call for mutual assistance from other utilities as far away as Illinois, though Corbett noted that most other utilities in region were also trying to restore service.

Utility crews were impeded by downed trees and the need to remove broken limbs before some repairs could take place. Chainsaw crews from the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources were called in to help clear the way.

The utility is worried more outages may be just around the corner. Overnight rain, ice and snow piled onto utility lines and tree limbs already made dangerously droopy by heavy snow that fell in a separate storm Monday. The outage numbers keep going up, even as temperatures rise.

"We are looking at a multiple-day restoration effort," said Engel Menendez. "We want our customers to understand that."

The last bad ice storm, on Jan. 7, 1994, left 549,000 customers without power. Hurricane Sandy caused 850,000 in 2012, the worst storm even in Peco's territory.

"Extensive damage," is how Engel Mendendez describes what's going on. "What's most concerning is it's still occurring."

Peco and other utilities are required to restore power first to vital public services, such as hospitals, law enforcement and fire stations. It then targets the biggest concentrations of customers for restoration.

Gov. Corbett said five hospitals in Southeastern Pennsylvania were operating on backup generators.

With outage numbers still rolling in, Peco believes it can restore power to most customers in the next "few days" with its own crews of in-house and contract workers who are in the field and taking calls from customers. But harder-hit communities might be out of power into the weekend, said Engel Menendez.

Until then, the utility is strongly warning residents to stay away from all downed lines that may be in their path.

"Customers need to remember that any downed electrical wires, they should always assume that's energized and stay away from it - even if the power is out in the neighborhood," said Engel Menendez.

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission said it was monitoring utilities' storm response, but spokeswoman Jennifer Kocher said the PUC would withhold judgment until it could do a thorough analysis.

"Everybody thinks mistakes are made -- that always happens in the middle of a storm," she said. "We won't know that for sure until after the fact. We're just focused now on getting everybody restored."

About 50 Peco employees clustered today in a windowless basement "war room" at the utility's Plymouth Meeting Service Center to organize the emergency response.

, about 50 people from various departments - human resources, government affairs, media relations - sit at conference tables lined with lap tops, discussing their roles as giant TV screens mounted to the wall display the news and PECO outage levels.Engel Menendez PECO's central hub for its storm response planning takes place in a windowless bunker.

Most of the employees work at offices elsewhere, Engel Menendez said. A majority of them will work 12 to 16 hours shifts, she said. But there are some perks - a table in a nearby hallway was lined with coffee, candy and snacks, and around 11 a.m., hoagies and chips were wheeled in for lunch.

The utility was operating under what it called "Operation Condition 5" - the highest response level for storms, and it will remain in effect until power is restored to all customers in the region, she said.

Menendez said.

That might not be until this weekend, she warned.

Customers who lose power are urged to notify Peco by calling 800-841-4141, or on its website, Peco.com.

PSE&G customers can report their outage 1-800-436-7734 or by logging into MyAccount on pseg,com.

amaykuth@phillynews.com

215-854-2947 @Maykuth