Oregon Utilities Work To Restore Power After Ice Storm Damage

While much of the snow and ice from last weekend’s winter storm has melted, hundreds of thousands of Oregonians are still without power, heat, internet and other services.

Portland General Electric (PGE) tweeted that its system "experienced catastrophic destruction" due to the storm. PGE had previously warned it would take days for some people to get their power back.

"Our friends, our family are experiencing these outages as well. We know exactly what you’re going through," PGE spokesman Steve Corson said Monday. "We know the frustration, and we’re working as fast and as hard as we can to get that power restored."

PGE said it has restored power for more than 320,000 customers. As of 9 a.m. Wednesday, PGE reported 151,379 customers without power, and Pacific Power reported 6,052 customers without power.

Both utility companies said crews were working around the clock, with backup called in from as far away as Nevada and Montana. PGE said more than 3,000 people are working to restore power for its customers. The issue, Corson explained, was that trees in several locations had come crashing onto PGE equipment, damaging power lines, transmission lines and even substations.