The residents of Northeast Ohio's Cuyahoga and Lake counties experienced a considerable power outage yesterday, with more than 16,000 FirstEnergy customers initially left in the dark. As reported by FOX8, the bulk of the outages occurred in the cities of Euclid in Cuyahoga County, where nearly all residents were affected, and in Wickliffe and Willowick in Lake County—in these areas, power has been restored.
Earlier reports from Cleveland19 detailed the outages spreading into Eastlake, Willoughby, and Willoughby Hills, leaving thousands without electricity. FirstEnergy confirmed that several primary lines from an east side substation were compromised, though the root cause of the failure remained under investigation. By the close of Thursday, nearly the entire affected area had power returned.
As the outage unfolded, frustrations grew among the affected communities, and FirstEnergy's spokesperson Hannah Catlett provided some clarification, "The cause of this afternoon’s outage is under investigation, but all customers should be restored shortly," Catlett told News 5 Cleveland. The outage notably hammered several primary lines from one of their east side substations, affecting over 20,000 customers, with swift work by crews restoring nearly half of those. The company worked quickly and safely, aiming to restore approximately 12,000 customers.
