Storms are a certainty throughout the summer in Michigan, and they can often cause significant damage to trees and the energy grid, resulting in power outages and safety hazards.
At DTE, we understand the frustration outages cause. To serve you better, we have dedicated teams supporting power restoration to make sure we can restore your electricity as safely and quickly as possible in those situations.
In the field, our overhead line workers and tree trimmers work up to 16-hour shifts throughout the day and night to serve customers. Their lone motivation is to get the power back on for affected communities while keeping everyone safe.
In addition to the crews out in the field, several other teams play critical roles during storm restoration. Company leadership, central dispatch, customer service, communications, etc. work to give instructions and dispatch crews, as well as update customers and the public with new information. Due to most teams working remotely as a result of COVID-19, that often means we’re collaborating on an even greater scale and getting support from team members all throughout Michigan.
For more information on how our teams collaborate during storm, watch our storm roles video below:
We also activate our Mobile Command Center and community vans in severely affected areas.
DTE Mobile Command Center. Photo by Mark Houston.
The Mobile Command Center allows us to deploy quickly to specific areas to resolve a variety of significant events, including large-scale storm-related outages. It’s a great tool to improve our ability to address issues impacting the energy grid, while providing customers updated estimates and information regarding their communities. We also deploy team members in our community vans to offer free water, ice and other common necessities to those in need.
As we continue to invest in upgraded infrastructure to make the grid more resilient to severe weather, while ensuring our teams are prepared for any scenario, we’re thankful for the continued patience of customers.
If you experience an outage, make sure to report it and check the status via our Outage Center or through the DTE Energy Mobile app.
Remember, safety is always the most important thing during an outage. Keep you and your family safe by reviewing DTE’s electrical safety tips here.