An ill-fated eagle caused a power outage in the Aleutian Homes neighborhood of Kodiak on Tuesday afternoon. According to Kodiak Electric Association CEO Darren Scott, an eagle was likely standing in the wrong spot on a transformer attached to the power line when it was electrocuted.
“Well if he gets in the wrong position, and he gets on a couple different things at the same time that are basically hot or grounded, and then it can cause an electrical short,” said Scott. Once that happens, he said, safety devices kick in to prevent the problem from spreading further in the system.
As a result, around 70 homes in the area lost power this afternoon while KEA inspected the disruption. Scott said they found the eagle’s body at the site when they went to inspect the problem.
This type of eagle-related power outage is uncommon, he said, but they’re looking into how to prevent it in the future.
“On certain structures, and you can see those in the downtown area near the fish processing sites and such, we’ll have certain types of deterrent devices on the the poles to help keep the eagles away,” he said. “We’ll evaluate this structure to see if it needs something like that.”
Power is now back on to the homes that briefly lost electricity, says Scott. The whole outage was just a little over two and a half hours.