CEL&P Power Outage And Restoration Efforts

At approximately 3:15 pm on Thursday, June 29, 2023, Crawfordsville Electric Light & Power (CEL&P) had two substation breakers trip offline as well as the west 138 kV transmission feed. The transmission feed did not cause an outage but did leave our system vulnerable to a system-wide outage should the east feed fail.

At the onset of the storm, approximately 1,900 CEL&P customers were without power. Two large areas were affected by the substation breakers tripping, those being the 231 north corridor, Country Club Rd, West Wabash, and Waynetown Road. Line crews began troubleshooting these areas and were able to restore power to both within 90 minutes.

Approximately 700 customers were still without power. We then used data from our automated meter system to identify smaller outage areas. At least twelve smaller areas were identified. Many had distribution lines down due to fallen trees.

Working in two-man crews, these areas were assessed and repaired individually. CEL&P was able to re-energize the west transmission feed at 9:30 pm. By midnight, customers without power had dwindled to 100 with most being individual service issues.

By 7 am Friday morning, all but twenty-five customers had power restored. Many of these customers will need the assistance of a licensed electrician in order to have damaged services repaired prior to reconnecting power. Crews worked all night and will stay on the job until all power is restored.

Our main priority is to re-establish power quickly and safely for customers without service. Limb and tree debris clean-up efforts will begin Monday, July 3, 2023. To report a power emergency, call CEL&P at 765-362-1900.