Thousands lose power in NJ after rain mixes with road salt

TRENTON — Rain and salt combined on Friday to send thousands into the dark around New Jersey.

PSE&G representative Brooke Houston said power had been restored to 35,000 customers since 9:30 a.m., leaving about 7,000 without power as of 3:30. This was mostly in Bergen, Morris and Passaic counties.

"The cause of the outages is weather-related. Rain and condensation, mixing with residual salt on roadways and walkways, compromised equipment. We are working to restore power to customers as quickly and safely as possible," PSE&G spokeswoman Brooke Houston told New Jersey 101.5.

Houston said that as the rain continues into the evening "we are prepared for additional power outages. We have additional personnel scheduled and on standby, and extra equipment at the ready."

A failed switching station caused about 25,000 customers in Cranford and Union in Union County. "When we are able to restore those switching stations we restore a lot of customers," Houston said.

She added their online outage map was not working correctly on Friday morning.

JCP&L spokesman Ron Morano said three unrelated outages, two of which involved sub stations, affected approximately 20,000 customers in Morris, Sussex and Union. He said Union County was restored but crews continue restoration work in the other counties.

As of 3:40 p.m. JCP&L's outage map showed 10,243 customers without power.

Crashes also took down wires and utility poles including incidents on Route 27 in Rahway, Route 70 in Cherry Hill and Route 22 in Scotch Plains.

Contact reporter Dan Alexander at Dan.Alexander@townsquaremedia.com or via Twitter @DanAlexanderNJ