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    Marlow Food Mart still open
February 1, 2010

Many Stephens County communities still in the dark

Kevin Kerr

MARLOW — Around Stephens County, residents, and in some cases whole communities, are still being left in the dark, but officials say that some areas should soon be able to see the results of long nights of hard work by power crews.

As of 8:30 p.m., Monday, Marlow City Manager Janice Cain said that the City of Marlow was waiting on PSO personnel to repair a feeding line into the Marlow substation.

“PSO should begin rebuilding the Marlow hub as soon as the line is fed into the substation,” Cain said. “They indicated that the power should be restored to Marlow by Friday.”

Even though power is scheduled to be restored to Marlow by Friday, residents and businesses may not see power restored to them for several days afterward due to localized power lines down and broken power poles.

“We’re hoping PSO meets their deadline as indicated to the City of Marlow,” Cain said.

Electric crews from Ponca City, Okeene, Sallisaw, Claremore and Skiatook have brought in 22 additional line personnel to work on clearing lines of tree limbs and to replace poles in Marlow, so that when the town has power available to it again, they can work much quicker at restoring electricity to residents.

“The task at hand will be to get customers on without digging our way into it,” Cain said.

Marlow does have water wells running on generators for now, but water levels are not at full capacity. Generators are also operating sewage lift stations and pumps to make sewage services available as well.

Marlow Fire Chief and Emergency Manager Jerome McCalvin reported that a Mobile Emergency Response Center (MERC) team arrived to provide medical care and assistance to those who are in need at the newly opened shelter at the First Baptist Church Life Center in Marlow. The shelter is fully staffed and all accommodations are accounted for, as well as a few creature comforts, such as family activities, videos for children and a basketball court.

McCalvin also said that a damage assessment team arrived Monday morning in Marlow and has been going door to door, starting in the northwest part of town, and looking at debris to see if it is blocking entrances and exits to homes or vehicles, or if branches have fallen on homes and caused damage. They are making assessments in taking those down and when chainsaw crews do arrive in the area, they will be given a workload list compiled of addresses and what debris to remove.

“They’re going to continue to do assessments around town, but they just started up (in the northwest part of town) today,” McCalvin said.

There are a few convenient stores being operated by generators in Marlow and fuel is available to people who need it for generators or their vehicles, and Marlow Food Mart is also open for non-perishable food items as well.

“We appreciate our citizens’ patience in working through this problem,” Cain said.

According to Bray mayor, Sammy Richardson, close to 20 power poles have been replaced in a four mile stretch near Bray but powerlines are not stretched across them yet since there are still many poles to replace and powerlines have not arrived as of 5 p.m. Monday. Rural water district No. 5 does have water, but levels are low and residents are asked to conserve water until further notice. In a bit of good news for Bray though, its power substation is now up and running, and individual circumstances can now be assessed.



— Kevin Kerr is a reporter for The Duncan Banner. He can be reached at 580-255-5354, Ext. 147, or via e-mail at kevin.kerr@duncanbanner.com.

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