More Than Half a Million Lose Power on East Coast

A powerful winter storm left about 650,000 electricity customers without power along the East Coast as blizzard conditions intensified and snow began to accumulate. Massachusetts suffered the most outages, with nearly 300,000 customers without electricity just after noon, according to Poweroutage.us.

The outages were driven largely by fallen poles, downed lines and trees damaged by wind and wet snow. Grid operators said the transmission system and power plants that form the backbone of the grid were holding up. ISO New England reported normal conditions across its system, and other operators, including the PJM Interconnection, also described normal operations.

"The regional grid remains in normal operating conditions and we have plenty of supply," said Matt Kakley, a spokesman for ISO New England, adding that the outages were on the distribution system. Coastal Massachusetts was hit hardest, with wind gusts in excess of 60 miles per hour and heavy, wet snow weighing down lines.

United States, Massachusetts

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