Transmission issue cause of Friday morning outage

A lightning arrester on a transmission line was the cause of a Friday morning outage that affected A&N Electric Cooperative members.

The outage affected about 4,000 co-op members between the Greenbush and Hallwood areas of Accomack County. 

The outage began around 6:30 a.m. and was restored by 8:30 a.m.

A lighting arrester is a device placed on electric lines that helps protect other equipment on the line from the damaging effects of lighting. When a lighting surge travels along a power line it is diverted through the arrester and then grounded. The number of times a lighting arrester is able to divert a lighting surge is limited. In some cases, a weakened arrester’s eventual failure can be delayed after its last successful surge protection.

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