A broken black spruce tree lies in the middle of Baron Park Road behind the old Lowe’s building on Monday, Dec. 4, 2017 in Kenai, Alaska. Gusts of wind up to 55 miles per hour whipped across the western Kenai Peninsula on Monday afternoon, knocking power lines and trees down and keeping first responders busy. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

A broken black spruce tree lies in the middle of Baron Park Road behind the old Lowe’s building on Monday, Dec. 4, 2017 in Kenai, Alaska. Gusts of wind up to 55 miles per hour whipped across the western Kenai Peninsula on Monday afternoon, knocking power lines and trees down and keeping first responders busy. (Photo by Elizabeth Earl/Peninsula Clarion)

Fallen trees cause power outages across central peninsula

High winds brought down trees across the Kenai Peninsula on Monday. In many cases, those trees also brought down power lines.

By 2 p.m, Central Emergency Services had responded to two downed power lines in Soldotna: one on Spruce Avenue that started a small fire in some construction debris, and another that fell across East Redoubt Street. Nikiski’s fire department responded to three downed lines. No injuries occurred in any of the incidents, according to CES and Nikiski Fire Department officials.

Homer Electric Association crews also spent the day rushing. Around 2 p.m, the electrical utility was dealing with 15 outages at once between Nikiski and Sterling, according to HEA Director of Member Relations Bruce Shelley.

“It’s been crazy,” Shelley said.

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The largest of these outages was in Kenai’s Beaver Loop area, where 263 meters lost power.

“There were able to bring that back on pretty quick — I believe they had it back on in 45 minutes,” Shelley said.

Other outages affected up to 43 meters. A Sunday power outage also left 214 members at the end of Funny River Road temporarily without power.

Reach Ben Boettger at benjamin.boettger@peninsulaclarion.com.

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