Following Thursday’s storm, a number of rural communities across our region were left without power. One local Fire Department decided to step up and help those without power. We spoke with the Miles Township Fire Department and local households about the outages.
Many households in Eastern Centre County without electricity throughout the day Friday as crews worked to fix what local Officials say is a less-than-ideal Power Infrastructure. Rebersburg Resident Donna Miller saying: “It might be another day or two before the electric is back on. It was to come on at 1pm, but now [West Penn Power is] saying another day or two.”
Area Residents around Rebersburg tell us their power went out around 4-5pm Thursday. Captain Jason Brooks of the Miles Township Fire Co. saying: “Here in Miles Township, we’ve had a lot of icing conditions, which has caused a lot of trees down, wires down, road closures, and power outages.” Seeing their community in need, Miles Township Fire Company saw the need to do some good. Captain Brooks adding: “So, we just decided to open our doors here today. We’ve got heat here, we’ve got power, we’ve got warm beverages. We have bathrooms available and we’re gonna be serving a meal today.”
With a number of Residents running their generators, they tell us they try to get by. Rebersburg Resident Andrew King saying: “We have lizards in there that need heat and if they don’t get heat, they’ll die. My wife works from home, so obviously we need power for her to work.” Others say it’s not their work that’s affected — but rather their kids’. Donna Miller adding: “Rebersburg school closed and hopefully they’re back Monday.”
It’s the type of community where neighbors know neighbors — willing to give each other a hand. Captain Brooks saying: “We’re a pretty close community here, so we do our job. We do our best to do our job to serve the community. And the response is generally very positive.”
West Penn Power did not return our immediate request for comment.