Thousands still in the dark in Asheville post-Helene. Duke Energy has a temporary fix

Duke Energy plans to restore power to thousands in a Helene-ravaged Asheville neighborhood within days using a temporary solution to a problem that would otherwise take months to fix.

Like the Biltmore Village community it serves, the Biltmore substation was ravaged by the Swannanoa River’s raging flood waters during the storm. Shredded mulch bags, plywood and a garden hose holder that raced downstream during the storm from a nearby Lowe’s are still tangled up in the substation’s lower level. The mangled station now sits just across a partially washed-out two-lane road from the river.

Fast food restaurants normally bustling with tourists visiting the nearby Biltmore Estate are washed out, too. There are mauled vehicles strewn haphazardly and a shipping container wrapped around a power transmission pole.

The damage has been a “logjam” to restoring power to about 6,700 customers, primarily in Biltmore Village and south Asheville, Duke spokesman Bill Norton said.

The substation’s lower level was “completely flooded out,” meaning it must be “completely rebuilt,” Norton said. There’s also likely water damage to the substation’s upper tier. Repairs will take three to four months.

“There’s no way we could keep customers waiting that long,” Norton said.

To provide a faster fix, special crews drove in a 200,000-pound mobile substation across the state from Garner. It’s expected to restore power to at least some of the 6,700 as soon as the weekend.

“They’re hurting, so we want to get their power on as quickly as possible,” Norton said.

It’s one of multiple mobile substations going in across Western North Carolina in an effort to help the hundreds of thousands still without power in Helene’s path.

Mobile substations provide ‘off-ramp’ for power

On Thursday afternoon, a Duke crew worked through mud and the odor of dirty river water to dig trenches and lay new copper wiring for the Biltmore mobile substation.

For some customers, “power will be back right away” once it’s online, Norton said. Others may have down power lines in their neighborhood that will also have to be addressed before power is restored.

“It’s nice to be able to get a chunk like this on all at once,” Norton said.

Another mobile substation is already up and running near New Salem Road, also along the Swannanoa River. A third is planned for Hot Springs, about an hour northwest of Asheville, to power its hydroelectric dam.

Substations are a critical connection for getting power to customers — like an off-ramp from the interstate into a town, Norton said.

Latest news on Western North Carolina power outages

Duke has restored power to more than 1 million in North Carolina in the week since Helene hit, but a little more than 200,000 are still in the dark in the state’s hard-hit mountain areas, according to Norton. With much of the rest of the state in good shape, Duke is sending everyone available west.

“It allows us to collapse all the resources into the mountain region,” he said.

Improving cell phone reception and internet service has made it easier for crews in the area, some of whom traveled from as far away as Canada, to communicate and work more efficiently, Norton said. Duke expects most customers to get their power back by the end of the week.

But for some areas, where roads have been completely washed out, it will take more time.

“If that road is gone, our poles are gone, the easement is gone. That is not a week-long restoration … It’ll be weeks,” Norton said.

This story was originally published October 4, 2024 at 6:00 AM.

Mary Ramsey

The Charlotte Observer

Mary Ramsey is the local government accountability reporter for The Charlotte Observer. A native of the Carolinas, she studied journalism at the University of South Carolina and has also worked in Phoenix, Arizona and Louisville, Kentucky. Support my work with a digital subscription