PECO workers trim trees, chances of storm power outages

COLLINGDALE, Pa. (WPVI) -- PECO contractors were busy Thursday trimming trees in Delaware County, cutting away branches from power lines that could trigger a real problem with the forecast calling for a lot of heavy, wet snow - the kind that causes power outages.

"We have every available employee as well as local contractors and crews that are coming in from our sister utility in Chicago ready to support, to be in the streets and restore service for our customers if our customers do lose service," said Ben Armstrong of PECO.

PECO spends $45 million a year pruning potentially troublesome branches. Still, the utility says it has a full army of power crews on standby to come to the rescue if the storm leaves thousands and thousands of customers in the region without the juice to heat their homes.

Dr. Jim Burrell, a pillar of the Collingdale community, knows the peril and headaches a snow-based mass loss of power can generate.

"There's always sporadic outages especially with the snow and heavy snow," said Dr. Burrell. "Thankfully though there's always a pretty good response from PECO when things happen and they get us back up pretty quickly."

PECO has well over 1.5 million customers in the region. Hopefully the power remains on for all of them.