A substantial portion of east Iola was without power for better than an hour at mid-day Wednesday because of a freakish occurrence.
Blame it on the moisture, said Corey Schinstock, assistant city administrator.
“Apparently what happened was moisture (from an overnight drizzle) caused an insulator to fail,” he said. “That then grounded electric into the pole through a crossarm and the interior of the pole started smoldering” where a bolt holds the crossarm in place.
“It’s kind of amazing that no one saw the pole smoking,” since it was along the west side of Kentucky Street — one of the busier streets in town — between Monroe and Douglas, Schinstock said.
Eventually, the pole broke and knocked out the circuit that feeds much of east Iola.
“Power was restored to Gas and most customers, except those east of Kentucky in the Kansas Avenue area by about 12:30,” after the outage began a little after 11 a.m., City Administrator Carl Slaugh said. Circuits have been temporarily rerouted until an outside company with bigger equipment is able to come and replace the pole.
All of Iola lost power Wednesday night during a severe thunderstorm for about 45 minutes.
Also during that time hail fell for a sustained period, with some pieces being quarter-size or larger.
The storm was part of a system that moved into the area and remained overnight, dumping 3.77 inches of rain. That is the most in a 24-hour period for Iola since 3.95 inches fell on Sept. 9, 2009.
The forecast is for a possibility of rain today, but the most severe weather has moved on to the east.
Iola plagued by power outages
