REGIONAL— Here we go again?
That was the question as the Timberjay went to press this week with the latest winter storm forecast to hit the region beginning late Wednesday and lingering into the weekend. The timing of the storm was a near perfect repeat from last week, although the latest winter blast was threatening to bring near-blizzard conditions and bitter cold windchills along with as much as a half foot of new snow to much of northeastern Minnesota.
That could simply add to the problems in the region following last week’s storm, which dumped 1-2 feet of heavy, wet snow and left tens of thousands of area residents without power.
Lake Vermilion was among the places hit hard by power outages, with hundreds of customers affected across the lake, many for extended periods.
At the peak, more than 12,700 Lake Country Power customers were without service throughout their coverage territory and many went well into the weekend before power was restored.
Linda and Gary Haugen, who lost power just after midnight last Wednesday, were among the luckier ones. Their outage only lasted about 24 hours according to Linda. Many other residents across the region weren’t so lucky as some outages extended into late Sunday night, according to Tami Zaun, public relations coordinator with Lake Country Power.
“Lake Country Power was pretty quick to respond for us,” said Haugen.
Last week’s storm was accompanied by mild temperatures, which helped to limit the impact for residents who need electricity to heat their homes. “It’s a good thing it was warm those days because it cooled down pretty fast in the house even so,” said Haugen. The Haugens do have a wood fireplace, so they were able to provide some heat to the house during the outage.
Potential outages from this week’s storm could be far more dire for many residents since temperatures are expected to remain below zero in northeastern Minnesota throughout the storm and high winds are expected to push windchills into the minus 40-50-degree range.
While the latest storm won’t feature the wet and sticky snow from last week’s event and likely won’t yield as much snow, high winds combined with tree branches still laden with last week’s snow, has the potential to create another round of widespread outages in the region.
“We are very concerned,” Zaun said, adding that frozen snow is still clinging to many trees and power lines, and that the winds forecasted with the coming storm are likely to spark more outages from broken branches and lines. “It’s a recipe for disaster,” she said.
The National Weather Service is also warning of widespread power outages from this week’s storm as already stressed trees, still laden with snow, shed branches or topple altogether. “The risk of power outages combined with the dangerously cold temperatures and windchills is particularly worrisome,” wrote the National Weather Service meteorology staff this week in a forecast discussion posted on Wednesday. “We encourage Northland residents to prepare now and develop a plan to stay warm should they lose power.”
Lake Country Power, which serves a broad swath of rural St. Louis, northern Lake, and eastern Itasca counties, is also warning its members to be prepared for extended power outages depending on the winds accompanying the storm. “Winds could gust as high as 55 mph,” according to the notice posted on the LCP website.  
Storm cleanup
If this week’s storm brings the forecasted conditions, it’s likely to be dispiriting for the many line crews who had worked so much overtime last week to restore power.
“This was almost worse than a summer storm,” said Tami Zaun, public relations coordinator for Lake Country Power, referring to last week’s snowfall. “Trucks were getting stuck especially on roads that had not been plowed yet or were barely plowed. They could be cutting a tree off the line while hearing another tree snapping down the line. I saw it firsthand and it was really bad out there.”   
In most cases, utilities can reach out to neighboring cooperatives or power companies when a storm brings power outages. But because last week’s storm impact was so widespread, none of that assistance was available. That same scenario could repeat this week as the brunt of the storm was expected to hit just to the south of the North Country.