Grape Creek Power Outage Causes Frustration and Disruption

Since approximately 7 a.m. this morning, 1,500 Grape Creek residents have had to suffer the West Texas morning temperatures of over 80 degrees without power, an issue AEP Texas workers are trying hard to fix, said Fred Hernandez, manager of External Affairs for the company.

“We have a transmission line problem,” Hernandez said. “We’re doing some work on it, and trying to figure out where exactly the problem might be. Those customers have been off since a little after 7 o’ clock this morning. It’s been a real inconvenience for those customers up there, and we apologize for that, but we’ve got our guys out there working diligently trying to figure out what the problem is.”

When the outage originally started this morning, Hernandez said there were approximately 1,800 people without power; however, when he last checked, that number dropped to approximately 1,500 Grape Creek residents without power. At this time, Hernandez said workers are trying to look up and down the transmission line in the area, and they’re closing and opening switches to try and isolate where the problem is. This unknown problem is only affecting the Grape Creek area, and Hernandez said the last ETA noted the issue should be resolved by noon; however, that time has passed and workers have yet to find the problem.

Because the issue is unknown, Grape Creek ISD released students early. No one could be reached for comment; however, a message on the district’s website states, “AEP is saying it will be noon before power is on at the schools today, but there is no guarantee of that. We cannot dismiss early and send children home to empty houses for safety reasons. We will be feeding lunch and will maintain regular school hours. Buses will run their regular schedules; however, if you have a child in our schools and would prefer to pick them up today, you may do so.”

Additionally, Grape Creek ISD staff said students would not be counted absent today, and phones are not operational at this time. At a little after 11:30 a.m., San Angelo LIVE! received a non-confirmed report that students had been released from Grape Greek schools while AEP struggles to fix this issue.

Update 12:32 p.m.

As of 12:15 p.m., Fred Hernandez with AEP said all Grape Creek residents should have power. Please contact AEP should that not be the case; however, as of now, power should be completely restored.