Damage caused by Tuesday morning’s s evere thunderstorm left 300 Oxford Township DTE customers without power.
A “handful” of downed power lines in the area and an electrical pole struck by lightning caused the outages, according to DTE Energy spokesman Len Singer.
According to Oxford Village Dispatcher Tony VanHouten, a caller phoned in shortly after 8 a.m. to report that lightning had struck an electrical pole on Metamora Road, just north of Oakwood Road, and it was on fire.
Oxford firefighters arrived on the scene at 8:09 a.m. and discovered live wires near the base of the pole were arcing, which caused the pole to catch on fire near the bottom.
Because the wires were live and arcing, firefighters could not safely extinguish the fire until DTE crews arrived to shut down the power.
A DTE crew arrived on the scene at 9:45 a.m.
Once the power was turned off, the fire extinguished itself.
However, firefighters sprayed the pole with water as a precautionary measure to ensure the fire was out.
Singer said the pole will have to be replaced, but DTE’s first priority is to restore service to all its township customers.
On Tuesday, Singer said “most, if not all” customers should have their power restored “by the end of the day,” assuming no more storms roll through the area and interfere with repairs.
According to Singer on Wednesday morning, “zero people are out of power” in the township.
“Everybody’s back,” he said.
Oxford’s Fire Station #2 (located at W. Drahner and Newman roads) was also hit by lightning Tuesday morning. According to Fire Chief Jack LeRoy, the bolt struck the station’s radio tower.
The lightning strike damaged the station’s telephone system, generator’s start-up panel and alarm system.
This is the second time lightning has struck Station #2. The first time was on July 21.
LeRoy said a bolt struck the ground close to the station, causing some damage to its systems.