Residents of Anchorage and the Matanuska-Susitna Borough faced significant power disruptions on Monday morning, affecting thousands of households. By 9:40 a.m., Chugach Electric Association announced via social media that they were experiencing a load-shedding event that impacted a large number of customers throughout the city.
According to Chugach Electric, early assessments revealed that both their systems and those of Matanuska Electric Association (MEA) experienced generation losses, leading to cascading outages. The post assured customers that additional generation resources were being deployed and that efforts for power restoration were underway. By 10:15 a.m., Chugach Electric confirmed that power had been fully restored to all affected members.
At roughly the same time, MEA indicated that a power outage had affected more than 19,000 customers in the region due to the same load-shedding event. They projected that power would also be restored to their customers by around 10:41 a.m.
Additionally, Homer Electric Association reported its own power outage which began at 9:45 a.m., affecting approximately 9,400 customers. This disruption was also traced back to a load-shedding event prompted by a power plant in Anchorage that tripped offline. By 10:15 a.m., Homer Electric announced that all circuits had been restored.
Load-shedding is a strategic management method used to prevent the electrical grid from overloading. Reflecting on a similar event from the previous year, Julie Hasquet, Communications Manager for Chugach Electric, indicated that load-shedding is a valuable tool for stabilizing power distribution when major generation capacities fail. “It allows us to stabilize the system, figure out what the problem is, and start bringing people back up,” she explained, emphasizing the effectiveness of the load-shedding protocols in averting more severe outages.
Furthermore, the Anchorage School District reported that at 10 a.m., approximately half of its schools were experiencing power outages. However, they confirmed that all generators at these schools were operational.
This ongoing situation highlights the resilience of local utility companies in managing unexpected outages and ensuring prompt restoration of services to the community. Community members are encouraged to stay updated as more information becomes available.