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Utility Members Assist Flood-Ravaged Fargo

April 6, 2009

IBEW members from North Dakota and Minnesota have descended on Fargo, N.D., to assist local utilities as the Red River continues to menace the city.

Members of Grand Forks Local 1426, employed by Xcel Energy as well as Cass County Electric Cooperative, Moorhead (Minn.) Public Service and the Red River Valley Cooperative, joined by other members called in from neighboring Minnesota, have been working overtime to protect the utility infrastructure even as their own homes were threatened by rising floodwaters.

“These employees are fighting on two fronts, at work and at home,” said Local 1426 Business Manager Seth Thompson, whose jurisdiction includes Fargo. “It’s been a very stressful time.”

Even as a late winter snowstorm threatened to renew danger, the Red River crested last week without breaching the manmade barriers fortified by miles of sandbags. By then, schools were closed and regular life had come to a standstill as residents watched the banks of the Red River overflow, flood homes in outlying areas and rise dangerously close to the brink of levies and hastily erected sandbag barriers.

Utilities were running 24-hour crews to ensure coverage in case of emergency.

“Our members have done an outstanding job of maintaining power,” said Thompson, who lives in Fargo. “Any power outages we have had they have done an outstanding job getting it back.”

Gas crews were in particularly high demand. As homes were evacuated, the utility employees followed to shut off gas lines into each residence. The process is painstaking, with members patrolling flooded neighborhoods in hip boots, life jackets and metal cleats to prevent them from slipping into the dark water, said St. Paul, Minn. Local 23 member Bruce Ohmann. Ten members from Local 23 employed by Xcel Energy are in Fargo. Members are also standing guard at substations, sandbagging to protect switchgear at ground level.

At times working in two or more feet of water, they have to carefully wade with shovels in hand to ensure they have a solid surface in front of them, Ohmann said.

“Like a blind man with a cane, they have to feel around to make sure they’re not walking off the edge of something,” he said.

Once danger of a flood has passed comes the effort of restoring gas and electric service, which could take weeks, with members entering each home to re-light pilot lights. Utilities, particularly investor-owned companies like Xcel, are additionally hampered by the work force shortages that have plagued the industry since deregulation took hold in the mid-1990s.

“Utilities aren’t staffing and replacing people as they retire,” Thompson said. “When major events happen, we don’t have the manpower and it makes our job more difficult. Unfortunately they have to send crews from hundreds of miles away.”

Other IBEW members have come to Fargo from Minneapolis Local 160 and Burnsville, Minn., Local 949.