Crews protect roads, bridges from heat. Power outages, water shortages reported
The historic heat wave has brought power outages, water shortages and proactive roadwork across Pierce County.
The National Weather Service forecast Tacoma’s high on Monday to be 106 degrees.
Cities further away from the Commencement Bay, including Sumner, Spanaway, Puyallup and Buckley, had projected highs of 110-112 degrees on Monday.
In addition to the extreme heat, Pierce and King counties are expected to see high levels of smog from pollution, the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency said Monday.
The extreme weather is straining utilities and roadways.
Outages, shortages
Puget Sound Energy reported 85 active outages Monday with 3,386 customers impacted, according to the company’s outage page. There were reported power outages in Steilacoom, Orting and Graham.
A Puget Sound Energy communications manager, Jarrett Tomalin, said there have been small and localized outages, but overall, the system is performing well.
“Over the weekend, we had about seven times the volume as we would on a typical June day with temperatures 30-40 degrees above normal,” Tomalin said in an email.
The primary causes for the outages were heat-related equipment failure, and trees and limbs coming into contact with lines.
There is enough energy to supply customers’ needs at this point, “whether with our own generation or energy we’ve been able to secure,” Tomalin said.
Puget Sound Energy has asked customers to reduce stress on the system by conserving energy.
“It will take a collective effort to get us through a historic day,” Tomalin said.
Steilacoom saw a power transformer blow Sunday because it was overloaded. A crew responded at 5 p.m. and service returned to residents by 9 p.m., town administrator Paul Loveless said.
Milton over the weekend asked its residents and people living in Edgewood to reduce water usage until Tuesday morning.
“Due to the extreme heat, water usage is at an all time high,” the city announcement said. “City of Milton water reservoirs are running low. We simply can’t keep up or catch up.”
The city put out another alert on Monday afternoon.
“We are asking that all residents of Milton, along with those we serve in Edgewood, continue to keep water usage to a minimum until Wednesday evening,” the Milton announcement said. “This doesn’t mean you need to let your garden die, not shower or flush your toilet. It means that we ask you to conserve water when and where possible.”
Infrastructure impacts
Intense heat can crack and warp concrete, so Pierce County and Tacoma have used sand and water to mitigate the heat.
Pierce County Planning and Public Works Department used sand and water trucks throughout the weekend to manage the temperatures of the roads, communications director Libby Catalinich said. Crews put down 120 yards of sand on roads near Lake Tapps and Central Pierce County that were heating up.
Tacoma has used water trucks to spray down the Hylebos and Murray Morgan Bridges from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
“The hope is the water will cool the steel members and limit expansion, which is the cause for a moveable bridge to get stuck open or closed during hot/inclement weather,” Tacoma Engineering Division manager Chris Larson said in an email.
There have been no issues with the bridges.
One sidewalk in Tacoma expanded from the heat. The Public Works Department reported the sidewalk in the 5200 block of South 19th Street buckled this weekend.
The Washington State Department of Transportation has been watching for heat impacts to concrete, spokesperson Stefanie Randolph said.
Heat can cause damage to concrete panels, expansion joints and protective sealants. Randolph said crews repaired a damaged concrete panel from this weekend in Tacoma on Interstate-5 near the Interstate-705 and state Route 7 shared entrance/exit.
Work was completed, but after temperatures increased this afternoon, the concrete cracked again. Crews have closed at least one lane and intend to return this evening, Randolph said.
Pieces are breaking away in the heat, but the ultimate cause of the damage is unknown.
“We can’t yet conclude that it’s heat related,” she said.
Cities and towns have opened up cooling centers with air conditioning and other amenities for residents.
This story was originally published June 28, 2021 at 1:02 PM.
