Power Outages
Reporting an Outage
To report an outage, call Tri-County EMC:
Contact Tri-County EMC by:
Report Outage Form
Please use this form to report an outage.
During an Outage
Check:
During a major outage event, please be assured that we are aware of the outage and working diligently and safely to restore your electric service.
High call volumes become evident during a major outage causing callers to receive a busy signal or message from the telephone system stating the call cannot be completed.
How Power Is Restored
Our top priority is to restore power safely to the greatest number of members in the shortest time possible.

Restoring power after a major storm is a big job that involves much more than throwing a switch and removing a tree from a line.

The major cause of outages is damage caused by fallen trees. That’s why it is important that we have a right-of-way maintenance program and can count on your support when tree trimming crews are in the area.
Step 1
Transmission towers and lines:
- Get attention first
- Supply power to 1 or more transmission substations
- Seldomly fail, but they can be damaged by a hurricane or tornado
- Serve tens of thousands of people by a 1 high-voltage transmission line
Step 2
Tri-County EMC has 14 distribution substations:
- Each serving hundreds or thousands of customers
- These distribution substations are checked first by local personnel when a major outage occurs
A problem here could be:
- Caused by failure in the transmission system supplying the substation
- Corrected at the substation level (power may be restored to a large number of people)
Step 3
Step 4
Tap lines:
- Are the final supply lines
- Carry power to the utility poles or underground transformers outside houses or other buildings
Line crews fix the remaining outages based on restoring service to the greatest number of members.
Step 5
Sometimes damage will occur on the service line between your house and the transformer on the nearby pole:
- This can explain why you have no power when your neighbor does
- Tri-County needs to know if you have an outage here so a service crew can repair it
Step 6
Members (not the co-op) are responsible for damage to the service installation on the building, call:
- ) A licensed electrician to make repairs
- ) The cooperative so power can be restored