‘Doesn’t make any sense’: Skykomish residents decry increased outages

SKYKOMISH — A winter storm knocking out power in Skykomish doesn’t surprise anyone. In fact, residents expect it.

But in recent years, the loggers and retirees who have escaped to the woods to live here say the power will go out after some light wind and sprinkling rain, or even on clear sunny days like last June or earlier this fall.

“I moved up here 20 years ago, and the last few years it seemed to me we’ve had more and longer power outages,” Mayor Henry Sladek said. “It went out a few times this summer when it was beautiful weather, so we only imagined what it would be like later in the year.”

Lack of communication from Puget Sound Energy, the regional utility company that covers this town of 160 or so people, has left community members frustrated and concerned. And with winter weather around the corner, anxieties are only growing.

Last month, Skykomish lost power four times, with the shortest outage lasting six hours and 42 minutes, according to records provided by PSE. The longest and most recent outage, on Oct. 27, lasted two days, seven hours and 32 minutes.

This year, the town along U.S. 2 has lost power nine total times, with PSE attributing only two of those to “major storm” weather. Community members have no direct contact for PSE to get updates from a person, and instead have to rely on contradictory automated text messages and maps to figure out when power might return.

PSE serves about 1.2 million customers with electricity across 6,000 square miles.

Ryan Murphy, the private utility’s director of electric operations, said PSE has increased scheduled visits from electrical first responders to the area surrounding the town. But in past years, more frequent storms have taken down trees and disrupted power lines.

“I think we could have done a little better job communicating the cause (for the October outage), the timing of restoration,” he said. “That is something we’re going to be working really hard on. We’re working on getting getting close to the community and communicating better.”

‘Why is it getting worse?’

The town is the last before drivers head over Stevens Pass. The turn-off to Skykomish is marked by Sky Gas Station and LouSki’s Deli.

Skykomish’s main street, across the south fork of the river of the same name, features Sky River Coffee, Onemish Lodge and the Whistling Post Saloon. Across the railroad tracks running through the center of town sit a row of houses nestled into the bottom of the mountainside.

A truck is already parked out front of Whistling Post before the doors open at noon. When the pub opens, a few locals meander in.

Blaine Brown co-owns the bar with his sister, Charlotte. The business has been in the family since 1980, and it’s one of the only places in town to get warm food. Brown has been increasingly frustrated with the frequent and prolonged power outages plaguing the town because they force the bar to limit its hours or close altogether.

Closing “the last few weeks, it could have been $2,000 in business, which is a lot to a small place, especially this time of year,” he said. “We’ve lost food,” and have to spend money “on gas and just sitting here babysitting the generators, they don’t always work perfectly.”

One of the community’s biggest concerns is that power outages can leave people stranded without warning.

“When the power is out, there’s no gasoline for sale in town because the gas station doesn’t have a generator,” said Austin Dunn, a community member and bartender at the Whistling Post. “You have to go to Gold Bar.”

But if your car is running on empty, you might not have a way to get to Gold Bar, which is 20 miles west.

Dunn has sold gasoline he bought for his generator to a tourist before.

Community members don’t blame PSE for the unreliable access to gas, but they do blame the company for keeping them in the dark, literally and figuratively.

“We’re all like, ‘Wow, this doesn’t make any sense’ because it’s something that never used to happen that now does,” Brown said. “Why is it getting worse?”

Other longtime residents echo Brown.

“We’ve had lots of extreme weather. We’ve had 8 feet of snow once — we’ve had the Bolt Creek Fire,” said John Lockmann, who’s been living in Skykomish with his wife since 1968. “Power outages came with all of them, but back in the day the power outages were far less frequent and didn’t last as long.”

PSE spokespeople explained Skykomish is supplied with electricity from two separate transmission lines, a PSE line from the west, and a Chelan County Public Utility District line from the east over the mountains. If one is down, usually the town can still get power from the other.

“This was not the case during the October outage because the line from the west had been de-energized as part of a planned grid hardening project,” spokesperson Gerald Tracy said in an email.

PSE is planning to put a two-mile stretch of transmission line underground along West Old Cascade Highway. Work is planned to begin in 2026.

Heading into the winter, Skykomish residents are hesitant to believe power will be dependable, even if both lines are active.

“We’re back up running both feeds. We should have a more reliable source coming into this storm season,” Sladek said. “We’ll see if that’s the case.”

Eliza Aronson: 425-339-3434; eliza.aronson@heraldnet.com; X: @ElizaAronson. Eliza’s stories are supported by the Herald’s Environmental and Climate Reporting Fund.