Alabama co-ops respond to December snow storm

The snow that fell Dec. 8 was unprecedented, with some areas of central and east Alabama receiving a foot of heavy, wet snow. It was the biggest snowfall for so early in the season, according to the AlabamaWx weather blog.

Some totals from the National Weather Service: Wedowee, 8 inches; Linden, 6 inches; Titus, 5 inches; and Centre, 4.8 inches.

For some co-ops, it was one of the largest outage events in recent memory.

At one point, an estimated 50,000 in Alabama were without power. Alabama’s rural electric co-ops immediately responded to outages in their own service territories as well as those of their neighbors.

Central Alabama EC received help from Covington, Cullman, Pea River, Pioneer, South Alabama, Southern Pine and Wiregrass co-ops. Coosa Valley EC received help from Dixie EC, and Black Warrior EMC received help from Baldwin and Tombigbee.

Cobb EMC in Georgia also requested crews, and Marshall-DeKalb EC and Sand Mountain EC responded to that call.

Black Warrior at its peak had nearly 7,000 meters out. Coosa Valley reported more than 250 separate interruptions, and Central reported 407 different outages.

Outages were sporadic and widespread, and crews worked in terrible weather conditions for extended hours. Most members were back on by Sunday, with the most remote areas back on by Monday.