Thousands of JCP&L customers without power in Ocean County NJ

💡The outage affected JCP&L customers in Toms River and Berkley Township

💡Equipment failure at a substation is the initial explanation for the outage

💡Most of the Toms River Regional School District is on a 90 minute delayed start

TOMS RIVER — Nearly 9,000 JCP&L customers started their day without power Wednesday morning as temperatures hovered around 20 degrees.

After the outage was initially reported at approximately 3:40 a.m. crews made steady progress in the pre-dawn to restore power with the last customers in Berkley Township restored by 7 a.m., according to JCP&L spokesman Chris Hoenig.  The final 4,000 Toms River customers were back by 8:30 a.m.

Hoenig told New Jersey 101.5 there was an equipment failure at a sub station in the Whiting section of Manchester. This sub station feeds a sub station in the Manitou Park section  Toms River. Crews are working to further isolate the line.

Toms River police reported multiple traffic lights out including along Route 37.

The Toms River School District delayed the start of school for its Tier 2, 3 and 4 schools until 9 a.m. due to the outage.  This includes all schools in the district except high schools.

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Recent outages in Ocean County

The outage is the latest in a series that have occurred in the Whiting area over the past few weeks. There were also large outages in Island Heights, Lakewood and Toms River.

A trip at a JCP&L substation in Whiting on Dec. 23 knocked out power for over 5,000 customers in Manchester and Lacey.

At Monday's Ocean County Commissioner meeting Commissioner Frank Sadeghi suggested filing a $1 billion lawsuit against JCP&L to get the utility's attention, according to the Asbury Park Press coverage of the meeting.

JCP&L in late 2023 announced a $935 million systemwide project called EnergizeNJ to upgrade overhead lines and sub stations that will make them more resistant to "high impact storms."

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