Power outages affect 27,000 customers

YOUNGSTOWN -- Some 27,000 customers of Ohio Edison and Penn Power were without power Monday in the Mahoning and Shenango valleys.
That number included 9,000 in Mahoning County, 11,000 in Ashtabula County, 3,000 in Columbiana County and 2,000 in the Clark area of Mercer County, according to Paul Harkey, Ohio Edison division manager.
Most of the failures were due to lightning, but some were caused by wind that blew trees or branches onto power lines, he added. As of 9:31 p.m., power had been restored to all but about 500 customers in the Ashtabula area.
About 3 p.m., lightning struck a transmission line at the Girard substation, knocking out power to 4,000 customers in the Girard area, including half of Girard and parts of Austintown and McDonald.
At 4:12 p.m., lightning caused a two-minute outage for some 7,190 customers in the Poland and Lowellville areas, Harkey said.