Six days after storm, about 1,700 households in Latvia still without power
By Friday evening some 1,700 Latvian households were still without electricity, even though the grid operator had hoped to finish repairs by then. Restoration for several hundred customers is expected to continue into Saturday.
Nearly six days after a powerful storm hit Latvia, some households are still waiting to get their power back. Grid operator AS "Sadales tīkls" had planned to complete restoration by Friday, but that target was missed — as of about 7 p.m. Friday, roughly 1,700 households remained without electricity.
Damage worse than expected
Company spokesperson Ilze Dimante said the scale and complexity of the damage turned out to be much greater than initially estimated. Large trees fell en masse onto power lines, wires were torn in places, and some poles were broken. In certain areas, crews first have to clear fallen trees and branches from the line routes before they can even reach the damage. As a result, restoring power to several hundred customers is expected to continue into Saturday.
From major lines to the smallest branches
Immediately after the storm, crews first restored the main power lines, where fixing a single fault could bring power back to hundreds or even thousands of customers at once. Now teams are working on smaller sections of the network, where repairs remain just as time-consuming, but each fixed fault now restores power to only one or two household customers.
The company also warned that some residents may receive notice that power has been restored while electricity still isn't reaching their home. This indicates a fault in the low-voltage network, which carries power the final stretch to individual buildings. In such cases, customers are asked to submit a new report, which helps the company pinpoint the remaining faults precisely.
More than 200 "Sadales tīkls" crews are working on storm recovery, with all available company resources mobilized. On Friday evening, most crews were concentrated in the hardest-hit regions, including the Aizkraukle and Jēkabpils municipalities.
As previously reported, the night of August 22 brought the strongest summer storm Latvia has seen in decades, with wind gusts exceeding 30 meters per second in places. It caused extensive damage to both the distribution and transmission electricity networks, initially cutting power to about 277,000 customers, while the damaged grid also disrupted communications, fuel stations and, in some areas, shops.
