Emergency crews and highway department responding to downed trees, power outages due to high winds

Cook County and the Tribal Lands of the Grand Portage Reservation spent the morning of Monday, Nov. 11 under a High Wind Warning from the National Weather Service. The wind picked up overnight from Sunday into Monday, and gusts were recorded as high as 60 mph in the early hours on Monday.

There were  reports of downed trees, including trees that were blown into power lines disrupting service, and in some cases, sparking or smoldering. Emergency crews across the county, as well as the Cook County Highway Department, Arrowhead Cooperative crews, and Grand Marais Public Utilities, began working before 6 a.m. to clear power lines and any roads obstructed by downed trees.

WTIP received reports of power outages across our listener area. An outage was also reported for Century Link internet customers in the Hovland area just after 7:30 a.m. on Monday.

Arrowhead Cooperative CEO John Twiest spoke to Mark Abrahamson on North Shore Morning to provide an update on service across the area. He said at that time, “We have outages from the very western end of our county, down in Lake County, all the way to the tribal border at Reservation River, or, excuse me, at Pigeon River, and all the way up to the Gunflint trail. So I mean literally, we have stuff out throughout the entire county and our entire service territory.”

Twiest said that about 2000 people, one third of Arrowhead customers, were experiencing power outages on Monday morning. He added that as the winds continued to blow more trees and debris down, the situation for crews working to restore power was “pretty rough.”

The National Weather Service’s High Wind Warning was in effect until 10 a.m. on Monday. The area saw an abrupt dying down of the wind around that time. As of 1:30 p.m. on Monday, crews from Arrowhead and local municipalities were still working to address outages.

Power outages should be reported to Arrowhead Cooperative by phone at (218) 663-7239, or through their website.

Audio of WTIP’s conversation with John Twiest can be found below.

This is an ongoing story. Last updated at 1:30 p.m. on Nov. 11, 2024

Kirsten Wisniewski November 11, 2024