Jersey Central Power & Light crews are performing emergency repairs at a local substation that is expected to result in electricity being shut off to parts of Barnegat and Waretown overnight, according to authorities.
The outage is expected to take place at any time and will result in a disconnection of electrical service until about 6 a.m. Thursday, according to an email alert sent to the public from the Barnegat Police Department.
“You’re encouraged to prepare for this extended outage and can visit Firstenergycorp.com/outages for tips to safely manage through a power outage,” police said in the alert.
Earlier in the day, an equipment failure at a substation in Waretown left 13,000 customers without power in Waretown and Barnegat, said Christopher R. Hoening, a JCP&L spokesman.
“We were able to restore 6,000 of them,” Hoenig said.
However, in order to effect repairs for everyone, the electric company must now take those 6,000 customers back off-line, he said.
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The company began notifying those affected customers about 90 minutes before the power was turned off to give them an opportunity to prepare for the outage and for those who are most vulnerable — such as individuals dependent on powered medical equipment in their homes — to make arrangements to leave their residences, if necessary, Hoenig explained.
“We are looking at a time frame of between 10 p.m. to 6 a.m., which is obviously dependent on a number of factors and how things go,” he said. “And, if everything goes perfect, hopefully we can restore power sooner than (6 a.m.) and if things don’t go perfect, then beyond that.”
Hoenig said the company will investigate the cause of the equipment failure at the substation, emphasizing that JCP&L’s priority on Wednesday night and Thursday morning was getting power restored to all customers affected by the issue. A customer represents a home, business or other site with a JCP&L account.
Contact Asbury Park Press reporter Erik Larsen at elarsen@gannettnj.com.