Small King County neighborhood frustrated by three-day power outage



ISSAQUAH, Wash. – One neighborhood on the Eastside says they’re prone to power outages and they’re frustrated that with every storm they get hit hard with a domino effect of challenges.

Off 195th Place SE in unincorporated King County between Issaquah and East Renton Highlands, people here say there’s just 21 customers on this grid. So when there’s a storm, they say, they’re the first to lose power.

“We got home from urgent care and we’re trying to mellow out and the power went out, so that was a bummer,” said homeowner Deanna Fraiser.

Monday’s storm knocked out power to tens of thousands in Puget Sound.  It didn’t spare 195th Pace Northeast or Liz Eaman’s home.

“Every time there’s an outage in our neighborhood, it's 21 customers out in this grid, and it's usually day two or three before we find out what’s going on,” said Eaman.

This makes Day Three of the recent storm.  A strong blast in the spring also knocked out power here for five days.

“We end up too cold to stay in our house, staying up at a hotel, maybe boarding our dogs when they can’t come with us, cleaning out our fridge, which is several hundred dollars,” said Eaman.

“Last night, we made tacos on our Coleman Camper -- what you use for camping -- we made delicious tacos and thankfully we have a wood-burning stove so thankfully we have some heat,” said Fraiser.

But at the Eamans, that’s not the case.  Along with no power, and no heat, she can’t work.

“I’m doing telemedicine. I’m a physician. My job is to get on the internet and help people with their health issues over the phone. Unfortunately, since we don’t have power, we don’t have internet, so I’m losing my wages as well,” said Eaman.

Fraiser’s well water electric pump isn’t working either.

“Lack of water so you can’t flush your toilets, so that’s been challenging,” Fraiser said, laughing.

Puget Sound Energy crews were out again in the neighborhood.  A corporate representative tells us there were so many outages scattered across the I-5 corridor it just made it really hard to get to everywhere as quickly as people might have liked.  With the holidays around the corner…

“I feel underserved by PSE in this area,” said Eaman.

The power came back on for this neighborhood at 6:25 p.m. Wednesday and the question now is when will another round of storms happen again and how much are they willing to shell out for a generator.