DTE ad dollars influencing reporting on outage numbers?

[MWmetalhead]

I'm not seeing any headline regarding outage numbers (which remain above 150,000 in DTE territory) on fox2detroit.com, clickondetroit.com, detroitnews.com, or cbsdetroit.com.

Shouldn't these outlets be providing restoration effort updates?

[Tackleberry]

Not a total shocker - you have a great point. I'm sure the DTE folks pushed hard on avoiding negative headlines this weekend. But when nearly a quarter of households in Metro Detroit are out of power and Joey Chestnut is taking up more space on the headlines I think something is out of wack!

[MWmetalhead]

The Detroit News finally posted an article to its home page about 15 minutes ago.

[edj]

The Detroit News had it as a headline Friday but it dropped off sometime Saturday. The article was a mishmash and poorly written.

[deadend]

You know DTE has some influence over the media with their ad dollars. DTE is a corrupt and greedy company

[km1125]

Would not doubt that has something to do with it.

Similarly, there doesn't seem to be any research when DTE asks for rate hikes. They just repeat whatever was in the public statement from DTE.

[SD45]

I lost power at my apartment for over 12 hours overnight during the hot streak. DTE has portable equipment on semi trailers in my neighborhood again.

[MotorCityRadioFreak]

To be fair, 400K total were out. Less than ideal conditions.

[MWmetalhead]

The way DTE deploys crews seems inefficient.

Instead of fixing downed lines and damaged poles immediately, they send assessment crews who often lack the equipment to make repairs directly.

Trucks often sit in staging areas for hours idled.

I'm no expert so I'm unable to pinpoint where the breakdown in operating procedures lies, but based on visual observation, there seem to be a lot of wasted man-hours and truck-hours.

DTE is so sloppy that no one has come to remove the branch (it's not even a limb) that is blocking two lanes of 12 Mile Rd. near Main St. in Royal Oak. Yellow tape, construction cones, and a flashing yellow arrow were put in place. It's been that way since Friday evening. No one on a DTE truck has a chainsaw & ten minutes apparently.

Also gotta love how the Detroit Zoo was forced to close on what might've otherwise been one of its busiest days of the summer (Saturday, July 4) due to DTE's indifference.

[craig11152]

I don't think it's DTE's job to remove branches from the road.
That's a job for city or county workers.

[MotorCityRadioFreak]

The way DTE deploys crews seems inefficient.

Instead of fixing downed lines and damaged poles immediately, they send assessment crews who often lack the equipment to make repairs directly.

Trucks often sit in staging areas for hours idled.

I'm no expert so I'm unable to pinpoint where the breakdown in operating procedures lies, but based on visual observation, there seem to be a lot of wasted man-hours and truck-hours.

DTE is so sloppy that no one has come to remove the branch (it's not even a limb) that is blocking two lanes of 12 Mile Rd. near Main St. in Royal Oak. Yellow tape, construction cones, and a flashing yellow arrow were put in place. It's been that way since Friday evening. No one on a DTE truck has a chainsaw & ten minutes apparently.

Also gotta love how the Detroit Zoo was forced to close on what might've otherwise been one of its busiest days of the summer (Saturday, July 4) due to DTE's indifference.

Having been one who worked there in the past, you may not understand, but they have to know whether they need a tree trim crew or just standard overhead line transmission crew. They need to know whether they need new transformers or splice new power lines. They also deploy office staff to the field to guard lines until OHL is available. It may seem inefficient to YOU. Their main goal is to clear pole to pole lines from obstruction. If trees are down and they do not affect power transmission, they are left for storm clean up after.

Zoos are not priority customers. Priority customers are hospitals, manufacturing plants, commerce buildings, government buildings, ITC(or whatever the hell they are called now) lines, schools etc.


That being said, their inability to convert overhead power to underground is a major indictment. Their refusal to add new substations to diffuse high circuit loads and replace ancient substation components is also appalling. They also should have never decommissioned Marysville and other power plants.

[MWmetalhead]

I don't think it's DTE's job to remove branches from the road.
That's a job for city or county workers.

Depends if a downed power line was involved. If no downed line was involved, then you are absolutely correct.

[MWmetalhead]

The way DTE deploys crews seems inefficient.

Instead of fixing downed lines and damaged poles immediately, they send assessment crews who often lack the equipment to make repairs directly.

Trucks often sit in staging areas for hours idled.

I'm no expert so I'm unable to pinpoint where the breakdown in operating procedures lies, but based on visual observation, there seem to be a lot of wasted man-hours and truck-hours.

DTE is so sloppy that no one has come to remove the branch (it's not even a limb) that is blocking two lanes of 12 Mile Rd. near Main St. in Royal Oak. Yellow tape, construction cones, and a flashing yellow arrow were put in place. It's been that way since Friday evening. No one on a DTE truck has a chainsaw & ten minutes apparently.

Also gotta love how the Detroit Zoo was forced to close on what might've otherwise been one of its busiest days of the summer (Saturday, July 4) due to DTE's indifference.

Having been one who worked there in the past, you may not understand, but they have to know whether they need a tree trim crew or just standard overhead line transmission crew. They need to know whether they need new transformers or splice new power lines. They also deploy office staff to the field to guard lines until OHL is available. It may seem inefficient to YOU. Their main goal is to clear pole to pole lines from obstruction. If trees are down and they do not affect power transmission, they are left for storm clean up after.

Zoos are not priority customers. Priority customers are hospitals, manufacturing plants, commerce buildings, government buildings, ITC(or whatever the hell they are called now) lines, schools etc.


That being said, their inability to convert overhead power to underground is a major indictment. Their refusal to add new substations to diffuse high circuit loads and replace ancient substation components is also appalling. They also should have never decommissioned Marysville and other power plants.

The lag time between crew A making the assessment and crew B arriving to make actual repairs is often too lengthy. That's a function of either poor logistical management or too little manpower.

During my childhood, I lived in an old neighborhood in the Grand Rapids area with above ground power lines mounted on poles. The trees in only a few spots grew over the power lines. I can recall only one multi-day outage ever (a derecho in 1991 that produced 80 mph gusts in parts of town), and in that instance, power was restored within 48 hours. During violent storms, power might be lost for five seconds before returning. Never lost power during the violent Memorial Day Weekend 1998 derecho. Consumers back then had an outstanding grid. When an actual outage was suffered, power was almost always restored within a matter of hours, not days.

[Rate This]

I don't think it's DTE's job to remove branches from the road.
That's a job for city or county workers.

Depends if a downed power line was involved. If no downed line was involved, then you are absolutely correct.

In your example was there 100% for sure a power line there in the road too?

[TC Talks]

I don't think it's DTE's job to remove branches from the road.
That's a job for city or county workers.

Consumers spent all last summer cutting back trees from the lines in my region. It is absolutely the utility's job to keep the lines clear. We haven't had a single outage since then.