A regional electrical outage affected customers in South Dakota and Wyoming on November 13, with several utilities experiencing disruptions after a transmission event caused power generation facilities and substations to go offline. Black Hills Energy reported that its system was also impacted by the incident.
According to the company, restoration efforts are ongoing, with crews working through a phased process to safely bring power back online. “To protect system safety and stability, we are using a phased process to restore power. It is critical that our power facilities ramp up slowly to prevent damage to the system. We appreciate your patience and will continue working this evening to restore service to all impacted customers. Estimated restoration time is 10 p.m.” Customers were advised they may experience short, intermittent outages such as blinking or flickering lights during the restoration period.
The outage began earlier in the day when a transmission facility outside of Black Hills Energy’s system failed, prompting activation of the company’s response plan. “We are responding to a large-scale regional electrical outage in South Dakota and Wyoming caused by a transmission facility located outside of our system. We have activated our response plan, and our personnel are well-trained to respond to events of this type,” the company stated.
By mid-afternoon, about half of affected customers had their service restored as teams worked segment by segment across the region. The company emphasized that customer and system safety remains its highest priority throughout the process.
Black Hills Energy encouraged customers seeking updates or information on outages to visit its website at blackhillsenergy.com/outages or follow its social media channels at https://www.facebook.com/blackhillsenergy/.
Customers were also reminded of basic safety tips during outages: keeping refrigerator doors closed, using flashlights instead of candles, avoiding indoor generator use, and treating non-functional traffic signals as four-way stops.
