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High temperatures, Toledo Edison power outage leaves Toledoans stuck in summer heat wave

Along Door Street in west Toledo, power outages are causing problems for businesses and residents trying to escape the sweltering weather.

TOLEDO, Ohio — Dorr Street in west Toledo was strangely quiet Wednesday. Many of the businesses were closed, and a neighboring housing complex was still. For resident Shingi Mavima, his whole day stopped at 2:50 p.m. when the power went out.

"So, I just got back from the barbershop," he said. "Thank God I got that out of the way. Got here and I was waiting for a Zoom meeting which was supposed to start at 3 p.m. It was maybe within 10-15 minutes to go, I just noticed that everything shut down."

Along Dorr Street, starting after North Reynolds Road and heading eastward to Douglas Road, various businesses closed because they didn't have any power. Seal Plus Auto Detail Cleanup had to shut down early, owner Kurt Schuster said. 

"When you don't have the luxuries of all the technology, oof, that hurts ya," Schuster said. 

Toledo Edison said there was a substation issue that was impacting about 6,000 customers. Crews were on site addressing the exact cause. Additionally, the company messaged customers attributing the outage to inclement weather.

Schuster has run Seal Plus for more than 40 years. He said detailing one car takes around two hours if he has access to all of his normal tools.

But if the power for his electronic tools is gone, a detail can take more than triple the time. When the power initially went out, Schuster said he didn't think too much of it.

"I thought it'd be a 10-minute, 15-minute deal. It didn't turn out that way," Schuster said.

For several hours he did what he could, working mostly in the dark. Schuster said he had to close early with at least four cars halfway done.

The Reynolds Corners Branch Library saw the same fate. The outage forced it to close early, depriving locals of a cooling center during the midday heat index of over 100 degrees.

Mavima said the complex is relatively quiet, but many residents have fled to cooler spaces, and he's following suit.

"See if I can drive out to a coffee shop and spend the next few hours over there doing some work," he said. "Hopefully, they have power."

After 9:30 p.m. WTOL 11 received a text message from Toledo Edison's Lauren Siburkis.

"All Toledo Edison customers have been restored," the message read. "Cause of the outage was due to an isolated issue within a substation; unlikely due to the heat. There was a power line down near a substation, issue was likely caused by the recent storm and this was a delayed equipment issue."

According to Toledo Edison's power outages map, as of 6:50 a.m., 41 people in Lucas County are without power and 30 people in Wood County are without power.

The map shows a significant outage caused by "tree damage" in the northwest corner of west Toledo on West Alexis Road. According to the map, crews have arrived and expect to repair the outage by 6 p.m.Thursday.

A small outage caused by inclement weather just west of South Reynolds Road in south Toledo also has crews on scene and is expected to be repaired by 6 p.m. Wednesday.

Three outages are in and around Stony Ridge in Troy Township, one of which was a significant outage caused by a vehicle accident.

RELATED: Power outages plague northwest Ohio, southeast Michigan as temps soar

RELATED: Work doesn't stop for ODOT in record-breaking heat

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