Post-Storm Update - June 30th, 2:45pm

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The Mayor’s office is feeding us updates and agency reports periodically; I’m going to try to summarize them into a neighborhood-level report as often as I can. Here we go:


This is BGE's outage map from 2:45pm today



Last night, a line of severe thunderstorms downed trees and disrupted electrical service in what BGE is reporting as the third largest outage in its history. Over 440,000 BGE customers statewide lost power - 94,206 of them here in Baltimore City. BGE has over 1,000 reports of power lines down, and stoplights remain dark throughout the City. BGE is anticipating the possibility of further outages in the event of additional storms this afternoon. Currently the National Weather Service is predicting a 30% chance of isolated storms throughout the afternoon. Restorations have begun and for 21,839 customers, power has been restored. Full restoration is estimated to be a long-term operation lasting several days.

Rec and Parks is reporting 332 trees are currently downed and impeding traffic; the Police Department is assisting Rec and Parks with prioritization. Removal of debris and utility lines is underway. Parks has a total of thirteen crews and two log trucks clearing debris. Transportation has two crews assisting Parks and signal techs responding to place stop signs at intersections without power. The heaviest hit areas appear to be Northern Pkwy from York east, and from Belair Ave and Frankfort to Kenwood. As of 12noon, 28 signals were still out, 14 with temporary stops, and 8 under generator power.

The City was planning on operating cooling centers prior to this incident in consideration of the weather forecast which calls for temperatures to surpass 100 degrees. Given power restoration estimates following this event, the establishment of these facilities becomes more critical. Most of the Code Red Rec Centers are operational. For those who can get downtown, the War Memorial Building is operational with air conditioning and bottled water. Two of the Community Action Centers (Northern and Northwest) did not have power as of 1pm, and so did not open as Code Red Centers. BCHD has opened 6 senior centers, and is working on opening some of the rec centers.

I’ll try to do another update later today. Stay cool, help your neighbors, and hang in there!

- Bill
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