General Manager Dale Haugen briefed those attending this morning’s meeting on all the details.
Haugen said 3,500 meters are still without power in the rural area and restoring all homes still in the dark will likely take more than a week.
To get all of the homes without electricity, we need about another week and half, Haugen told the governor.
In order to get the power back up as quickly as possible, MWEC has brought in all the help they can. "All of Mountrail-Williams crews are out working, and we brought in about 200 additional line personnel that are assisting us," Haugen said.
It will take longer to get all of the oil field up and running.
Haugen said it will be three weeks until every last part of the oil field has power again.
Also part of the mess left by the blizzard is clean up. All over the rural area debris is strewn, and it will take months to get everything back to normal.
"Water wells, things that are non-critical at this point, all of the clean up and everything else with the county ditches and township roads we think it will be pretty much throughout the summer to restore back to original," Haugen said. "This thing is just going on and on and on."
The MWEC crews that are out in the area are also conducting a survey on all the damage. With nearly 40 percent of the area surveyed Haugen said the damage is worse than he has ever seen.
"I've been here 31 years and this is the first time in 31 years that we have had total devastation in two counties in which no consumer was receiving electricity," Haugen said.
Gov. Dalrymple, who will remain in the area throughout Tuesday, is still accessing all the damage to determine what the state should do.
Gov. Dalrymple brought Major General David Sprynczynatyk of the National Guard with him so he can begin to survey the damage and determine if it is enough to ask the president to declare the area a natural disaster area.
