Lake County Storm Severe Weather Response
Lake County and adjoining counties have been impacted by several severe weather events over the past few weeks, most recently the widespread straight-line winds that swept through the county yesterday morning (Tuesday, July 11th). Many communities were still working to clean up debris and restore damages from the severe windstorms of June 21st and June 30th, and the significant damage that occurred yesterday impacted most communities in Lake County to some extent.
Many trees were damaged or destroyed by the strong winds across the county. Wind gusts in excess of seventy miles per hour (70 mph) were measured at several locations including the Lake County Emergency Operations Center in Libertyville, and the storms also brought frequent lightning to the area. The falling trees damaged many homes, cars, and utility infrastructure, and major power outages remain throughout the northeastern Illinois area.
Lake County officials participate in regular conference calls with Commonwealth-Edison, and will continue to work with Com-Ed personnel to facilitate the expeditious restoration of electrical service across the county. Com-Ed has identified that Monday's storm now ranks as one of the two most serious in their records in terms of the number of customers impacted, with more than 850,000 affected customers at the peak of the outage. A few hundred thousand outages have already been restored, but it will likely require multiple days of work for all damaged infrastructure to be repaired and all outages to be restored. The northern region of the Com-Ed service area was the most significantly impacted, and this region includes all of Lake County. Com-Ed reports that they expect to have 90% of outages in the northern region restored by noon on Friday and 99% of all northern region outages restored by 5:00 p.m. on Sunday, July 17. Commonwealth Edison reports that more than 400 of their own crews are working on restoration, and expect to have an additional 300 contract crews from as far away as Texas, Alabama, and Florida working on service restoration in our area by Thursday.
Lake County employees and volunteers have been providing emergency assistance throughout the county, doing important work such as keeping vital water and waste-water facilities functioning, clearing debris from roads, directing traffic, processing emergency calls, providing health services, supporting communities, and collaborating with partner units of government and private organizations throughout the county.
As a result of the widespread damage and impact with the most recent storm, Lake County Board Chairman David Stolman has proclaimed a state of emergency in Lake County, a proclamation which facilitates the sharing of resources and supports the county's request to the Illinois Emergency Management Agency for assistance with debris removal. While it isn't clear that any state or federal disaster assistance will become available, Lake County Emergency Management is compiling initial damage and cost assessments from communities in regard to all of the recent storms.
Because of the expected prolonged power outages, several communities have opened "cooling centers" where residents may seek shelter from the heat and humidity. Lake County and partners are working to improve the safety of intersections where signals are out or malfunctioning. The Lake County Division of Transportation reminds drivers to treat any intersection where signals are malfunctioning as if that intersection is an all-way stop.
The Lake County Health Department and Community Health Centers remind residents of these important food and water safety guidelines for power outages:
Food Safety
If the power is out for less than two hours, then the food in your refrigerator and freezer will be safe to consume. While the power is out, keep the refrigerator and freezer doors closed as much as possible to keep food cold for longer.
If the power is out for longer than two hours, protect refrigerated foods by packing milk, other dairy products, meat, fish, eggs, gravy, and spoilable leftovers into a cooler surrounded by ice. Inexpensive styrofoam coolers are fine for this purpose. For longer duration outages, a freezer that is half full will hold food safely for up to 24 hours and a full freezer will hold food safely for 48 hours. Do not open the freezer door if you can avoid it. When preparing previously refrigerated food, use a food thermometer to check the temperature of your food right before you cook or eat it. Throw away any food that has a temperature of more than 40 degrees Fahrenheit.
Drinking Water Safety
When power goes out, water purification systems may not be functioning fully. Safe water for drinking, cooking, and personal hygiene includes bottled, boiled, or treated water. Here are some general rules concerning water for drinking, cooking, and personal hygiene. Remember:
� Do not use contaminated water to wash dishes, brush your teeth, wash and prepare food, wash your hands, make ice, or make baby formula. If possible, use baby formula that does not need to have water added.
� If you use bottled water, be sure it came from a safe source. If you do not know that the water came from a safe source, you should boil or treat it before you use it. Use only bottled, boiled, or treated water until your supply is tested and found safe.
� Boiling water, when practical, is the preferred way to kill harmful bacteria and parasites. Bringing water to a rolling boil for one minute will kill most organisms.
� If you don't have clean, safe, bottled water and if boiling is not possible, you often can make water safer to drink by using a disinfectant, such as unscented household chlorine bleach, iodine, or chlorine dioxide tablets. These can kill most harmful organisms, such as viruses and bacteria. However, only chlorine dioxide tablets are effective in controlling more resistant organisms, such as the parasite Cryptosporidium.
Lake County encourages residents to be patient with the widespread damage and continuing service outages, and to stay safe by paying attention to the situation around their home, business, school, or neighborhood.
Com Ed estimates that restoration of all outages will take multiple days. Power outages and downed wires should be reported to Com Ed at 1-800-Edison-1. Please do not go near any power lines that are down. For information on power outages, including maps and the restoration process, please visit:
https://www.comed.com/sites/customerservice/Pages/OutageInformation.aspx