Police & Fire

“We’re out of the worst of it” says OEM director on ice storm

Power was restored Friday morning to all but about 1,200 residents in Clark County according to outage reports from Entergy Arkansas and South Central Electric Cooperative.

Clark County residents woke to a messy Thursday morning as (hopefully) the last bout of wintry precipitation swept through southern Arkansas. Ice from freezing rain weighed trees and limbs that fell onto roadways and power lines, causing power outages for thousands across the region.

Most residents in Gurdon remained without power Thursday night.

At 2 p.m. Thursday, power remained out for many residents as crews from Entergy Arkansas and South Central Electric Cooperative continued efforts to restore electricity. At 3:30 p.m. an estimated 700 Arkadelphia residents in neighborhoods south of Pine Street remained without power. In Gurdon and neighboring communities, more than 1,000 residents were without power, according to Entergy’s outage map. Restoration time for those outages will be updated on Entergy’s website.

Shortly before 6 p.m. power had been restored to the majority of Arkadelphia residents, although Gurdon remained “mostly without power,” reported Tate Chanler, director of the county’s Office of Emergency Management.

About the same time, South Central Electric Cooperative reported on its Facebook page that crews had been working all day to restore power but “unfortunately, it is looking like we will not have everyone on tonight.” The cooperative added that it anticipates all of its customers to have power restored Friday.

At about 9:30 p.m. Thursday we heard reports that previously restored power had been lost again. At that time, Entergy was reporting an estimated 2,700 Arkadelphia residents were without power. There were 3,400 Entergy customers without power in Clark County at 10:30 p.m.

The National Weather Service in Little Rock is predicting that precipitation should move out of this corner of the state by Thursday evening, and temperatures are expected to remain above freezing until after midnight. Temperatures are expected to be in the 40s by mid-Friday.

For our readers who do not use social media, these are the posts we made on Facebook until power was restored for us:

7 AM: Entergy is showing 500+ outages in Arkadelphia, with restoration planned by 10 pm. South Central is reporting 3,000+ outages in Clark County. There are also reports of trees across the road in the Manchester area (one on Hwy 7 between Manchester and Delong roads, and another on 128/L’Eau Frais bottoms) as well as on Hwy 51 between Joan and Brown Springs.

10 AM UPDATE: Clark County OEM is reporting multiple trees down throughout the county, some over roads. Entergy and South Central Electric Cooperative outages are totaling an estimated 7,500 in Clark County. Arkadelphia police chief says there are some city streets blocked by trees. We know of the 2300 block of Elaine and North 15th Street between Mill Creek and Northridge.

2 PM UPDATE: As the ice is beginning to melt off the trees and power lines, Clark County Office of Emergency Management says “we’re out of the worst” of the storm. There are still some trees and limbs falling but not nearly as many as were falling before dawn. There are still outages throughout the county. Entergy and South Central crews are continuing to work, and restoration times will be updated as the damage is assessed. Roadways are generally clear but be cautious of debris left over from cleared trees.

Continue monitoring this website and our Facebook page for updates.