One day in late July, I stood in the doorway of my parents’ Silver Spring house and watched what I thought was a tornado. One hundred-foot trees were whipping around like licorice. Within a few minutes, the wind stopped, and the air was still. Once it was safe to drive, I went home to find that two trees at least 80 feet tall and 70 years old had fallen in our front yard, taking the power lines down with them.
A lot of people ended up much worse off than we did. During Summer MegaStorm 2010, trees fell and power was knocked out to hundreds of thousands of homes, some for a few hours, some for up to four days. Traffic lights were out on major roads for up to three days.
We have lost power many times over the years, often under mysterious circumstances having nothing to do with weather and (I suspect) everything to do with the gremlins living under our house. But, I have a confession to make: This time, our power did not go out. Yes, the lines were trapped on the ground under the fallen trees, whose trunks were each a few feet in diameter. However, somehow, the power line remained live. That’s the good part—and the bad part. Because we had power, Pepco was in no hurry to help us. In spite of the fact that a live power line on the ground sounds like a really bad idea, sort of like snakes on a plane. Pepco told us not to go near or remove the trees while they were touching the live power lines. We were caught in one of those absurd scenarios that have become so commonplace they’re rendered acceptable. Of course it was important for Pepco to get the power back on for people who lost it, but it also seemed important to not get electrocuted.
It was seven suspenseful days before the situation was “resolved.” I put that in quotes because as of this writing, I’m still calling Pepco to remind them that the power cable is not yet permanently attached to our house. I logged what seemed like 20 hours calling them during the week following the storm. Note to file: It does help to keep calling; they just don’t want you to know that. (I was told this by one very tired operator who had been on duty all night and clearly didn’t care anymore if the truth got out.)
I provide the following information, knowing that at this very moment, Pepco is being investigated because the governor would like to know why Montgomery County residents are moving to grass huts in Borneo for more reliable utility service. (Oh, maybe that’s just me.)
The timeline, such as it is:
The trees fell on Sunday. People gathered in our driveway to stare at the big trees that were down on the power lines. We thought of selling tickets. Someone suggested lemonade.
On Tuesday, a Pepco assessment team came and put yellow “caution” tape around the trees. A worker said, “Wow, the power’s still on. That’s amazing.” When a utility worker calls your situation “amazing,” that means there is no logical explanation for what you are experiencing. I was told a crew would be coming to remove the trees and free the wires in about an hour.
No one came. Our neighbor, whose garage access was temporarily blocked by the fallen trees, started cutting branches. I wondered if the guy with the chainsaw also had a spare set of defibrillator paddles.
On Thursday, a man in a hardhat with a Delmarva Power insignia came to the door and told my son (!) to get an electrician. To do what, exactly? The man left nothing in writing. Name? Instructions? Zip. Repeated calls to Pepco yielded no enlightening information.
“Yes, we see that noted here,” an operator told me.
“What does it mean?”
“We’re not sure…”
And still, I called an electrician, just in case.
On Friday, meeting the electrician at the house, I stumbled on a Pepco worker who had been pulled from his substation job to help with storm assessment. He was putting up more yellow “caution” tape around our wires.
“I can’t believe no one did this,” he said. “This is a live wire. This is dangerous.”
Really? I guess we should stop the limbo game, in that case.
Will someone be out soon to help us? I asked him. I appreciated the yellow tape, but by then it seemed more like red tape.
You’re on the schedule for today, I was told, before midnight.
The tree crew and the wire crew would come together (what we’d been hearing all week). When they came, as I’d also been hearing all week, our power would be off for the time it takes to do the work—many hours, judging by the trees’ size and position. All week, I’d been living with the expectation that we’d lose power at any moment anyway, so this wasn’t news. At least someone was finally going to do something about it.
Or so I thought.
Later that evening:
5 p.m.: No crew yet.
8 p.m.: No crew yet. (I called and was told, “They have until 11:30 p.m.”)
11:45 p.m.: Ding! They lose. Now, I’m told, they will come between midnight and 2 a.m. I’ve decided I’m not staying up for this event.
Saturday morning:
5 a.m.: I wake up. They haven’t come. I call, and I’m told a crew has been dispatched! Hooray! I’ll believe it when I see it…
5:30 a.m.: A small bucket truck pulls up outside. I don’t think they even have a chainsaw. I ask them who will get the trees off the wires?
They’re going to shut off power to the old wire and pull a new one, they tell me. Yay! Brilliant. But why, when I asked Pepco repeatedly if they’d be doing this, after the first assessment crew had been to my house—Why did they consistently tell me otherwise?
No one has been able to answer that question.
5:35 a.m.: The ladder on the truck is too short to reach our roof. They cannot connect the wire. They will leave and come back with a taller ladder. No! Don’t leave! I consider chaining myself to their bumper.
I hear the dispatcher on the radio say, “Don’t leave. There’s no other crew available today.” The dispatcher is my friend. He should be promoted. I want him to take a long vacation after this is done. They will send someone with a taller ladder, he tells them, so just wait.
For how long?
How long did it take to wait for Godot?
5:45 a.m.: The man on the truck has a brilliant idea. Instead of waiting for the taller ladder, he will try using the bucket to climb onto our roof and hang the service cable. If this works, I may hug him. He may not want me to, but I may do it anyway. And then he should go on a long vacation, but somewhere different than the dispatcher. Because, you know, not much of a vacation, that.
It works! The bucket reaches, the man climbs onto the roof, and he connects the new power line. We’re in business. The dominoes will now fall into place. We can remove the tree, fix our driveway, park in the garage, buy groceries, go on with our lives. But, okay, I didn’t hug him.
I never want to call Pepco again. And believe me, they never want to hear from me. When they see my number on the Caller ID, the operators all stare at the phone. No one moves.
“You take it.”
“No, you!”
“What should I tell her?”
“Tell her the tree crew and the wire crew will come together. Tell her they’re coming tomorrow morning.”
“But we don’t know that for sure!”
“It doesn’t matter. We’ll all be off shift by then.”
“Brilliant.”
We still have a broken driveway, and a hole where the trees once stood that’s big enough to swallow a Prius. Right now the hole is filled with sawdust. Maybe we should save the sawdust for the winter, and when it snows and we are trapped because the plow doesn’t come for a week, we can spread it on our street and escape.
