Joe Arnold of the Kentucky Electric Cooperatives on the Severe Weather Aftermath

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, we've had tornadoes throughout Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana.
Joining us to talk about some of the other areas
that have been impacted by these storms. Joe Arnold with
the Kentucky Electric Cooperative, I appreciate your time. He is
the vice president of strategic communications for the cooperative. Joe,

(00:22):
where do we stand today.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Well, all across the state Tony, about twenty thousand of
our co op members all across the state. As you know,
each of these co ops are locally owned and operated
by their own members, and so it's widespread. It started,
of course, yesterday afternoon frankly, with some of the high winds,
and then just progressed more severely as the tornadic activity

(00:47):
you went through. I don't know, you know, as far
as any of our co ops getting hit by any
kind of tornadoes, but certainly the storms were heavy enough.
So everywhere from you know, Frankly, about three thousand and
Warren our ECC, which is near Bowling Green and that
serves that area, Clark Energy, which is just east of Lexington.

(01:10):
Probably the hardest hit county that we can see is Menifee,
where about two thirds of the members in that county
have are without power this morning, but very very widespread,
not just one particular area.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, it was interesting. I saw that with the Minafee
County and yeah it is. It's two thirds of the
county and twenty one people are the customer's number and
two eight hundred and twenty six have been without power.
When did that start? Do you know? Was it yesterday
afternoon or into the evening hours?

Speaker 2 (01:42):
No? No, I mean that that was all for the
most part, within the last few hours. I mean that
was probably like around I would say, you know, maybe
you know, three or four am is when that that
kind of swept through. So that storm, despite the tech
that it's was so fast, I mean as far as
moving through Jefferson County, you know overnight you know, about
one or two this morning. This is just a reminder

(02:03):
just how wide our state is, you know, in terms
of how long it takes for things to kind of
go all the way through. But this is uh, you know,
it's it's you can pretty much chart the progression of
the storm just by the progression of the of the
the map lighting up on the outage map.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
Yeah, I think did it take more of a eastern
turn than they expected. I'm not quite sure, but it
seemed to me when I was looking at the early
maps projection maps, that it was going to be widespread,
but more going up to the northeast a little bit.
I didn't expect, for example, you know, Pie County and

(02:41):
some of those areas to be struck.

Speaker 2 (02:45):
That's right, I mean, I guess, I guess, come to
think of it, the winds have always been expected to be,
you know, to come through. I think the where where
we're somewhat for our friends who are in southeastern Kentucky,
especially who have gone through such disastrous flooding over the
last you know, three or four years. Really you're you're

(03:06):
looking at that situation where the forecast rains are not
projected to be as severe there as they are along
the Ohio River corridor that you're talking about. But now
you're right, I had the same impression. I was not
no offense to the people along the Isole River, but
I was hoping that our friends who have been really
just kind of hammered over the last several years, might
have gotten a spare this time. But you're right, Martin

(03:28):
County all the way to the very you know, Virginia
border and Menifee County. There that's a situation where proportionally
they maybe were among the hardest hits. Now, of course
that's not they're not as heavily populated either. So even
though at the higher percentage, there is still just a
few thousand members of our co ops who were out
of power this morning, and of.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
Course we hope that they're not going to receive the
flooding that they've had in the past a few years.

Speaker 2 (03:53):
That host Now at the same time, you're still talking
about three or four inches of rain even southeast Kentucky.
But we are so concerned as I'm sure you are
too and everyone about what we're talking about here the
next several days because well, obviously just for you know,
just safety concerns and everything else, but from from a

(04:14):
power restoration standpoint, when you have you know, ten to
fifteen inches of rain and flash flooding, there are some
areas that you can't access, you know, without a truck,
And you can't drive a truck through flooded waters right
because you don't know whether the road is washed up
below you or what's going on. So if the forecasts,
you know, stay true and you have that kind of

(04:34):
tremendous rainfall. You know that's going to complicate some of
our power restoration. On top of, of course the safety concerns.
You have a flash.

Speaker 1 (04:41):
Flooding, Yeah, I know. I think you live here in Louisville.
Did you have any impact at your home?

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Very fortunate we did not. I think we have got
a couple of a couple of flashes here and there,
but for the most part we've been fine. How about you.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
Well, I live about three miles from where they've got
two and a half miles, I should say, where they've
closed down Blanket Baker there at plant Side Drive where
the Lexus of Story is and the Chick fil A.
And then I tried to get around going some back
roads to cut back because I couldn't turn around where

(05:17):
I was on Blanket Baker Lane, and lo and behold
there were trees down, just a lot of places. So
I got here about thirty eight minutes later that I
expected to this.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
Well, you're reminding me telling you of a great piece
of advice for folks who are out this morning. Don't
presume that the authorities know where every tree has gone down.
I was driving in to Anchor the WHS eleven news
on you know, good morning, Kentuckyana. After a big storm
back in two thousand and maybe two or three, and

(05:50):
just so happened the road that I was on, they
had not flagged it, and I totaled my car because
there was a tree. I couldn't see it. I mean,
it was just like I ran into a tree basically
on the on the road after the overnight storm. So
don't presume that everything has been flagged here this morning.
You might have some big limbs or some other things
that have come down that might not be And the

(06:12):
street lights were out too, of course, because the power
was out that morning. Son.

Speaker 1 (06:16):
Yeah, I mean, you know South Public Road, for example,
Popper Lane, there's some places there where it's really dicey
and it was very very dark. I mean, obviously we've
got cloud these guys. There's no lights really, you know,
street lights to speak to in these areas. And even
one place. Another thing is if you're on some of
these curvy roads, back roads, is it's not necessarily that

(06:40):
a tree is down in the road, but it's something
One tree that almost ran into was snapped and that
part the place where it snapped was sticking out into
the roadway. You know, as making it was making a
right blind curve. So yeah, it's it's it's pretty it's

(07:00):
pretty dangerous, particularly when you're talking about getting out here
in the early morning hours and it's still dark.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
So all right, careful out there. Yep, thanks buddy. With
Let's say a prayer for everybody who's whose power is out,
and say a prayer for those line workers are out
there to restore it and be careful.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
Indeed, Joe always appreciate your time. Thanks for joining us
this morning.

Speaker 2 (07:21):
Thanks buddy.

Speaker 1 (07:22):
All right, Joe Arnold with, the vice president of strategic
Communications for the Kentucky Electric Cooperative. It's a five forty two.
Bobby Yellis has our traffic. We've got more coming to way.
Scotty has sports in just a few on news Radio
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