Days after windstorm, residents finally see power and Colorado governor calls for investigation
Four days after powerful winds blew through Colorado's Front Range, those living in Golden's Applewood neighborhood finally had a reason to celebrate.
"Just before four o'clock it came back on, we were so happy you should have seen the dances we were doing," Stanley Chinyerere said.
But until today Chinyerere says things at their home were much more tense.
"It became an ongoing ordeal a nightmare you may say because we didn't know how if we had to take him to the emergency room," he said.
The family relies on a nebulizer to get their son, Nelson, through his severe asthma attacks.
When they lost power, they lost that lifeline.
"That evening we went about twice trying the inhaler and it didn't work I had to go find some place that we could use a plug," he said.
They've been making those trips multiple times a day, every day since.
"We had to bundle and sleep close to each other because the colder it gets the worse it becomes for him," Chinyerere said.
Across the street, Megan Snow says the cold was her biggest concern as well.
"When it was snowing and we lost power it was cold inside the house and at least it was in the 50s inside the house at night because of the warm weather during the days," she said.
While it was a quiet four days, she says its nothing she hasn't seen before.
"In Louisiana a week and a half with the hurricane," she said.
Both neighbors understand Xcel Energy wanting to protect homes still they wish there would have been better communication about what to expect and when.
"There wasn't much response," Chinyerere said.
"We weren't getting updates there's a map you can look on through Xcel and as of yesterday afternoon it was ten o'clock tonight." Snow added.
The governor sent a letter to Xcel Energy voicing his own concerns about the lengthy outage.
"During the days following the high winds event, I heard from many frustrated Coloradans who lost power for multiple days without clear indication from Xcel when it would be restored- from businesses that could not operate and lost perishable inventories and income, from hospitals that struggled to respond to vulnerable community members, and from schools that had to close all day Monday. Once again, the company failed to minimize outages and effectively communicate with customers about an upcoming change that would impact people's regular lives," Gov. Jared Polis's letter said.
He is now directing the public utilities commission to investigate Xcel in order to better understand how they fell short and how they can improve operations in the future.
