Broken cable cuts power in Cleveland’s Hough

CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – As the winds increase, some in Cleveland’s Hough are already without power and fear the blackout will last even longer.

That’s because the threat of more outages could keep the crews, who worked to restore power to Hough, busy with more service calls.

Fred Barkley, who lives in the 9000 block of Edmunds Avenue, has been without power for days.

Her apartment is pitch black after sunset.

“Day four. I’m still frozen, still hungry, still without electricity,” he said.

Barkley even used the four burners on his gas stove for light and warmth, a risky step the disabled man feels compelled to take.

He’s asking Cleveland Public Power to do better.

“You can’t have a business of this magnitude that treats the average person in the dead of winter like that,” he said. “It’s inexcusable.”

Every bit of food in Barkley’s fridge has gone bad, and he is forced to sleep fully clothed to stay warm.

But her home was not the only one in the Hough neighborhood that went down on Thursday.

Several houses in the blocks surrounding East 93rd Street were also affected.

Barkley and others who spoke to 19 News said the power company had not presented them with any real timeline for when the lights would come back on.

“They mentioned something about an underground cable that needs to be fixed,” he said.

Many of the streetlights in the Hough neighborhood were also dark, raising safety concerns for Hough resident Anita Cason.

“You couldn’t even see if someone had to walk in front of you to catch you,” she said. “You couldn’t see. That’s how dark it was in here.

19 News tracked down several trucks and Cleveland Public Power employees working on the issue in the East 93rd Street and Ansel Road area.

The company did not respond to a 19 News request for information about the outage, but sources say power crews have been working for several days to repair an underground cable responsible for the problem.

PPC teams say they hope to turn the lights back on late Sunday or maybe Monday, but another team will need to come in and splice the new cable once it’s in place.

But Barkley fears the warning of high winds will no longer remove electricity from the entire town and put Hough’s problems on the back burner.

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