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Gov. Strickland declares state Of emergency

Gov. Ted Strickland declared a state of emergency today to help Ohio government better respond to the wind storm that slammed the state on Sunday, killing up to six people and knocking out power to nearly 2 million homes and businesses.

The declaration makes it easier for the state to provide assistance to local communities, such as allowing state road crews to help with clean up of debris on county roads, and seek federal assistance if necessary, Strickland said.

The governor said 84 of the state's 88 counties have reported damage from the storm, which had reports of wind gusts of 75 miles per hour.

"In my lifetime, I don't remember hurricane-strength wind in Ohio," Strickland said.

Eleven counties have declared emergencies, including Delaware, Licking and Madison, and 46 state roads are reported to be closed or restricted with falling trees, power lines or other debris, Strickland said.

In addition, one-third of the state's traffic signals aren't working, and 450 school districts canceled classes today, the governor said. Officials urged residents to avoid any power lines and debris.

Representatives of state utilities estimated it could take several days to restore power to all 1.92 million customers without electricity as of 11 a.m. because the damage was scattered across the state and will take significant time in some cases to repair.

Hampering those efforts was the fact that some utilities had sent crews or contractors to the Gulf region to help restore power there in the wake of Hurricane Ike. Those crews are being recalled to Ohio.


AEP workers rushing back from Texas, but damage called unprecedented

American Electric Power is recalling hundreds of workers from Texas and expects hundreds more from other utilities to arrive by Tuesday or early Wednesday to restore power to central Ohio neighborhoods.

But AEP Ohio President Joe Hamrock said it still might take up to a week for everyone to be back on line.

"This is a time of crisis," Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman said during a noon news conference at City Hall. "It's not just a 24-hour deal."

Up to 25 percent of AEP's 600 workers were in Texas helping crews there restore electricity to the millions who lost power because of Hurricane Ike, AEP spokeswoman Terri Flora said.

Joining them in central Ohio will be another 600 line workers who are coming in from eastern utility companies,, Flora said.

AEP also has 300 contractors helping to restore power and will have 1,000 contractors removing trees and debris from lines.

Crews are working around the state but are concentrating on central Ohio because it was so hard hit, she said.

Hamrock called the damage unprecedented in scope. As of 1:45 p.m., AEP's Web site showed that 301,000 Franklin County customers - almost 60 percent - were without power. Statewide, the number was almost 654,000, close to half of AEP Ohio's customers.

Flora said the number continued to increase because people are finally getting through to report outages.

Because of the massive number of outages, most Franklin County school systems closed schools today. Columbus schools Superintendent Gene Harris said 68 schools are without power. She said the decision to reopen schools will be day-to-day.

Gahanna Superintendent Gregg Morris said the wind tore off most of the roof of the multipurpose room of Blacklick Elementary School.

The National Weather Service reported that a peak wind gust of 75 mph was recorded at Port Columbus, with gusts of more than 60 mph reported over a three-hour period in late afternoon and early evening.

Other peak wind gusts in the area were 69 mph at both Bolton Field and Rickenbacker Airport and 63 mph at Don Scott Field.

"What we experienced was a hurricane-force wind gust," said Myron Padgett, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Wilmington.

That gust was born from a combination of the remnants of Hurricane Ike and a cold front.

A Hilliard man was electrocuted while fixing a generator at a state juvenile detention center. At least three people were killed by toppled trees in southwestern Ohio, and more than 1 million homes lost power in the state.

Coleman said power should be restored to the city's electric customers by the end of the day. The city has 14,000 customers.

Some 3,000 of the city's electric customers were without power, utilities spokesman Rick Tilton said.

Lancaster-based South Central Power Co. reported 20,000 outages across its service territory, including Fairfield, Pickaway and Ross counties and a small slice of Franklin County.

Not all power will be restored today, according a company telephone recording. Because of heavy call volume, customers will be unable to speak with company representatives, the recording said.

The howling winds also turned a blaze that firefighters had been battling all day at Kurtz Bros., 2850 Rohr Rd., in Groveport, into an inferno that sent flames high into the night sky as piles of mulch burned.

The wind sheared a large section of the J.C. Penney Logistics Center's roof next to the outlet store off Brice Road.

The Delaware County Fair was shut down in the late afternoon Sunday, as was Via Colori, a Goodale Park festival. In Fairfield, Licking and Hocking counties, the high winds downed trees and power lines, and some of them were blocking roads, officials said. Officials in Union County northwest of Columbus and Ross County in southern Ohio reported the same problems.

Some businesses were able to shelter and distract those without power.