PORTLAND, Maine — Residents living on the upper floors of Franklin Towers in Portland can expect power to be fully restored in the coming days.
According to Portland Housing Authority Executive Director Cheryl Sessions, electrical contractors are expected to finish work on a temporary fix Friday, which is expected to restore full power to floors 7-16.
Sessions said, however, that due to testing of the temporary electrical system, power isn't expected to be turned on until Tuesday. Sessions said that electrical crews have been working on a temporary fix that will go around a damaged piece of equipment.
"It just goes around the place that we had to cut out that was damaged," Sessions said.
"It's possible that there's some other part that was corrupted by the electrical load from the lightning," Sessions added. "So they want to be doing thorough testing before they switch it over to make sure there's nothing else that comes up."
Sessions said testing will take place over the coming days, and power is anticipated to be restored on Tuesday.
Sessions added the building is believed to have been struck by lightning on Aug. 26, which caused the outage. She said that the electrical system for the first six floors was replaced before the storm due to flood damage. The reason the upper portion of the building was impacted is that it was older equipment.
For the last two weeks, residents on floors seven through 16 have only been receiving low-load power to just a handful of outlets in each apartment. Residents and Sessions said it's enough power to run necessary medical devices, such as c-pap machines, but not enough to power a stove.
"It's been a nightmare, to say the least," Beverly Collins said.
Collins said she lives on the 16th floor of the building and is anxiously awaiting her power to be restored.
"It's a real tough position to be in. Because I'm torn between being angry and being supportive of the staff," Beverly said.
Collins said she's been very appreciative of the food provided by Portland Housing Authority during the outage. PHA partnered with Preble Street to provide meals to residents who were unable to cook during the outage.
Sessions said, however, that Preble Street had only planned to provide meals through Friday, so PHA officials will be providing meals until power is restored. Now residents like Collins are anxiously waiting to once again have full use of their power.
"That would be wonderful. I'd be very happy, and I'd use my stove right away," Collins said.