March 9, 2022 Outage:

UPDATE: Today's outage was caused by an excavator working in the area; the excavator hit an underground primary cable. This is a great opportunity to remind everyone to call before you dig (1-800-922-1987).

1-800-922-1987
1:09 p.m. UPDATE: Most accounts are back on other than the airport area; work continues
11:55 a.m.: We are aware of an outage in the Creede area; more information to follow. At this time, we are not aware of the cause, but crews are in the area patrolling the line. We hope to have power restored by 1:45 p.m., but will update as more information becomes available.

March 7, 2022 Outage:

According to Mark Stutz with Tri-State (REC's power supplier), "at approximately 4 p.m. MST Monday, March 7, a Tri-State contractor was excavating a hole to relocate a structure on our San Luis Valley-to-Stanley tap, a 115-kilovolt transmission line, in support of an Xcel Energy project to upgrade some of its lines. During the excavation, the existing structure sagged into the excavated hole, due to sandy soils. The sagging structure allowed the conductors on our transmission line to contact an energized Xcel Energy 69-kilovolt transmission line, which caused the Xcel Energy line to trip off. To protect the crews, the tripped line had to remain de-energized, while the sagging structure was stabilized and wires removed from Xcel Energy's transmission line." The incident took out power to both Xcel and SLVREC/Ciello customers in the northern part of the Valley. The incident had nothing to do with SLVREC's facilities, but unfortunately affected about 1,400 REC members and 2,000 Ciello customers. Xcel, Tri-State and SLVREC continue to commit resources to improve infrastructure for electric grid reliability and resiliency here in the SLV.