By SHELLEY TERRY - Staff Writer - sterry@starbeacon.com
ASHTABULA TOWNSHIP — Anyone trying to call Millennium Inorganic Chemicals Thursday received a busy signal as crews worked to repair circuits, company and Illuminating Co. officials said.
The plant, 2900 Middle Road, was one of several industries affected by Wednesday’s outages and fires in the northeast corner of the township.
“The biggest thing is we have no outside communication,” said Scott Strayer, site director at Millennium. “(The outage) slowed things down a little bit.”
Strayer said the company called in “as many resources” as possible to get the plant up and running again at full throttle.
Ashta Chemicals, 5509 Middle Road, also did not have phone or Internet service Thursday, said Brad Westfall, company president.
Illuminating Co. officials said the electrical power problems began when a utility transformer at State and Middle roads exploded and caught fire shortly before noon Wednesday. They believe a semi-truck pulled the lower communication wires down as it passed under them.
The wires then snapped, rattling the poles and starting several fires, said Bill Larson, Illuminating Co.’s operations manager, Ashtabula plant.
The incident impacted 1,480 Illuminating Co. customers and severely damaged several utility poles and wires, said Mark Jones, area manager for the Illuminating Co.
“Everyone should have power, but I don’t know about other utilities,” Jones said Thursday. “We had a lot of melting wire (on Wednesday).”
The blaze at the pole on the southeast corner of the Middle and State roads then caused power lines to fall, igniting a grass fire.
Ashtabula Township firefighters blocked off the roads, but could not extinguish the fires because the power was still on, firefighter Wayne Lomas said.
Larson called in the Illuminating Co. team from Concord Township to pick up the downed wires and restore power.
In the meantime, he had to turn off the power at Millennium, Ashta, Vision Park and other industries, as well as homes and restaurants in the area. Employees were trapped inside their workplace because of downed wires on the roadways.
At 12:45 p.m., an army of Illuminating Co. trucks arrived to begin restoring power.
Ashtabula Township firefighters put out the fires at 1 p.m., with Sheffield Township assisting.
For more than three hours, northern Ashtabula and Ashtabula Township residents were without power so firefighters could snuff out the fires, Jones said
