Indiana Michigan Power has got its eye on the weather as southwest Michigan could be looking at high winds and snow this week.
I&M spokesperson Kara Stevenson tells us the company has mutual aid agreements with other utilities so that when major outages occur, extra help can be brought in.
“Storms or hurricanes or thunderstorms — I think we’ve seen a little bit of almost all of those this week, but crews on are on the ground and busy in their areas, so they can gauge what they’re accomplishing and see what kind of mutual aid they might need to finish the job,” Stevenson said.
I&M crews will often respond to disasters outside their service area when they’re needed, like when Hurricane Maria catastrophically damaged Puerto Rico’s electrical power system in 2017.
Stevenson says I&M meteorologists follow each weather event to help crews be prepared. They’re doing that this week.
“We do what we can to make sure our customers are safe, and that’s making sure that the communications come across. Social media, text alerts, email alerts, on our website. And that gives our customers a chance to make a plan.”
Stevenson tells us it’s better to be over-prepared than underprepared. Therefore, everyone’s advised to take steps now to be ready for severe weather.
The National Weather Service says southwest Michigan could be hit with as much as eight inches of snow Saturday, along with wind gusts of up to 50 miles per hour.
