MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Almost 22,000 Memphis, Light, Gas and Water (MLGW) customers are without power again after thunderstorms and strong winds hit Shelby County Sunday, July 2.
Sunday's thunderstorms onset a setback for MLGW repair crews who were already working to repair damages and restore outages caused by the first round of thunderstorms that hit Memphis and surrounding areas Sunday, June 25.
Now repair crews will spend more time this week working to resolve new widespread outages.
On Sunday morning before severe weather started, MLGW said repair crews would continue weekend restoration efforts to resolve outages for the remaining 1500 customers who originally lost power after last week's storms.
MLGW also said repair crews made major progress, restoring outages for 120,500 customers over the weekend.
The utility company said most of the remaining outages were concentrated in Shelby Forest, Ellendale-Bartlett and Fisherville areas.
According to the MLGW, crews found several underground faults while making repairs Friday, July 1. MLGW said underground faults must be repaired first before fully restoring power for customers, and repairing faults is "tricky" and more time consuming.
Customers should continue to report outages in their areas. MLGW said outages at the circuit distribution level line tend to mask other outages at the fuse, transformer or service drop level. For this reason, successfully repairing the outage at the circuit does not guarantee power restoration.
Now with a heavier workload and more customers affected by the second round of thunderstorms, there is no estimate for how long it will take for MLGW to complete repairs.