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Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas
Top Stories
Thursday, September 19, 2002
Storms cause overnight power outages in Pecos area
By JENNIFER GALVAN
And
JON FULBRIGHT
Staff Writer
PECOS, Thurs., Sept. 19, 2002 -- Late night storms have had Texas-New Mexico
Power Company crew members working the hard on the west side of town
for the past 12 hours, and caused blackouts for Pecos residents on
the south side of town and in rural sections of Reeves County.
According to Customer Relations Manager, Donald Hunt, a windstorm came
in at about 10 p.m. causing a lot of damage on transmitters, distributors
and other items.
"There are now 36 poles down," Hunt said. "We have three crews working
on them now and two more on the way."
Each T-NMP crew is made up of four members.
With two contractors working in some of the damaged area, Hunt added that
two crews from Central Texas and two from New Mexico will be coming in to
assist them, Hunt said.
According to Hunt, on the west side of town there were 55-foot and 75-foot
transmitter poles that were damaged because of the high winds.
Because of the size of poles, they cannot be housed here Hunt said that
they would have to be brought in from outside the area.
Though the manufacture of the poles is based out of Oklahoma, the poles
are kept near by in case they are to be needed, Hunt said.
As crewmembers work on the damaged area, Hunt will be working on pen pointing
areas of high priority.
"I am heading out to Toyah to talk to the Sheriff and Police Department,"
Hunt said. "There are a lot of people involved with life support."
According to Hunt everyone is working on the solving the problems and
providing the community with service.
"Tommy Terry is getting the crews together," Hunt said. "He is familiar
with these areas."
With Texas-New Mexico Power Company working on the poles that are down,
Pecos Police Department Lt. Kelly Davis said that the storm did not create
any major problems for them last night, although the Criminal Justice Center
could be observed without lights for over an hour last night. Police vehicles
and pick-ups with CJC workers were patrolling the perimeter of the building
after the storm cut power to the building, homes and other structures and
street lights south of Stafford Boulevard.
"We do have a backup generator," Davis said. "We even check it frequently
as required."
Davis added that the generator kicks on automatically but even though
the computers have a UPS, they were the only things that were not working.
"We also have a manual override for everything," Davis said.
The power outage included all buildings along Interstate 20 west of Trans-Pecos
Foods, and forced Reeves County Hospital to put its emergency generators
into operation. T-NMP crews were working to fix the problem about 12:30 a.m.,
when power was cut to homes located north of Stafford Boulevard.
Power was restored to both sides of Stafford shortly before 1 a.m., but
some areas west of town, including the Texas Agriculture Experiment Station,
remained without power as of early this afternoon.
The experiment station reported four-tenths of an inch of rain from last
night's storm, while areas inside Pecos received slightly less rain.
According to Davis, with the computers down the only thing they were not
able to do is print out police reports.
However, a man will be coming in to install a back up system on their
computers so that next time they will be able to work during a storm.
"The computers don't control everything," Davis said. "They just keep
paper work and record but they don't lose anything."
Davis continued to state they the Criminal Justice Center is set up to
have back up.
"We managed to keep the bonfire from burning," Davis said in closing.
PHS homecoming parade, bonfire set for today
By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
PECOS, Thurs., Sept. 19, 2002 -- Several homecoming activities have taken
place throughout this week in preparation for Friday evening's homecoming
game with the Eagles versus the Brownfield Cubs.
The Homecoming Queen and King will be crowned during halftime during the
game at Eagle Stadium. The game is set to begin at 7:30 p.m.
A homecoming parade will be held today, with lineup at 5:30 at the corner
of Second and Eddy streets. The parade will travel down Eddy Street and conclude
at the baseball field at the Pecos High School.
Other homecoming activities include the Bonfire scheduled for this evening
at 7 p.m., at the old landfill.
This year's homecoming court include freshman prince and princess, Preston
Myles and Michelle Wein; sophomore prince and princess, Aurelio Lopez and
Jessica Abila; junior prince and princess, Ray Pena and Alessandra Carrasco.
Senior King nominees are Matthew Levario, Tony Trujillo and Freddy Torres.
Senior queen nominees include: Adriana Mendoza, Abby Romo and Lara Weinacht.
Bonfire activities will begin with Student Council president Phillip Salcido
officially welcoming everyone to the bonfire and leading the crowd in the
pledge of allegiance.
The band will then play the school song and superintendent Don Love will
read a speech at the start of this evening's activities.
The band will also play a number from their halftime show; the football
captain will give a pep speech; cheerleaders will start with "When I Say
Eagles" chant; head football coach Fred Carter will give his pep speech;
the cheerleaders will cheer again and Pecos High School principal Danny Rodriguez
will give the closing remarks before the lighting of the bonfire.
Firemen get call, but PHS bonfire survives night
By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
PECOS, Thurs., Sept. 19, 2002 -- Vandals once again were out at the site
of the Pecos High School bonfire, which is scheduled for tonight at
the old landfill. But unlike the past two years, this time the bonfire
pile itself was not set ablaze before the scheduled time.
The "pranksters" set an old couch on fire about 50 feet from the bonfire
at about 2:30 a.m., and fire personnel were out at the scene.
"The actual fire was an old couch that they pulled to about 50 feet from
the actual bonfire," said Town of Pecos City Fire Marshal Jack Brookshire.
Pecos Police Chief Clay McKinney had said earlier that extra personnel
would be out patrolling the area and would be out in full force this evening
for the big event.
The call came in at about 2:30 a.m., by Pecos Police Officer Melissa Roberts,
who was passing by the bonfire.
"She said that at first she thought it was the bonfire that had been set
on fire early again," said Brookshire. "But when we got there we found that
it was just that old couch," he said.
Brookshire was referring to the fact that the bonfire has been "lit" early
two years in a row.
"We're also investigating the theft of a stop sign and a railroad crossing
sign," said Brookshire.
The stop sign was taken from Eddy and Adams Streets and the railroad crossing
sign was stolen from the railroad crossing on "F" Street and Highway 80,
near B&B Wreckers.
"This incident also happened last evening," said Brookshire.
Both signs were found on top of the bonfire when police and fire personnel
went out to the scene. "When we go out there we found both signs on top of
the bonfire, which is something they wanted us to find," he said.
Just one fire trucker was called out to the scene and the fire was quickly
extinguished, according to Brookshire. "There was nothing to it, because
luckily it was just that one couch that was set on fire," he said.
Brookshire said that the investigation into the theft of signs would be
closely investigated. "It's very dangerous to take a stop sign, because someone
might go through that intersection and not stop, since there is no sign and
this can cause major accidents," said Brookshire.
"The same thing for railroad crossing signs," said Brookshire. "There
might be someone new in the area who doesn't know there is a railroad crossing
there and not stop, just go through it and by the time they do, they can
be struck by a train."
This offense is very serious, because of the consequences and ramifications,
according to Brookshire. "It might seem like a game to them, but it can be
very harmful to motorists," he said.
Honor Society hosts exes tea on Friday
PECOS, Thurs., Sept. 19, 2002 -- The National Honor Society will be hosting
an Ex's Tea on Friday from 11 a.m. till noon in the foyer of the Pecos High
School New Gym.
Community members wanting to join the Pecos Citizens Police Academy can
go by the Pecos Police Department and picking up an application from Community
Office, Mike Balog.
Weather
PECOS, Thurs., Sept. 19, 2002 -- High Wednesday 93. Low this morning 61.
Rainfall last 24 hours at Texas A&M Experiment Station .4 inch.
Forecast for tonight: Partly cloudy. Lows around 55. Northeast winds
5 to 15 mph. Friday: Mostly sunny. Highs 85 to 90. South winds 10
to 20 mph. Friday night: Mostly clear. Lows 55 to 60. Saturday:
Partly cloudy. Highs around 85. Sunday: Partly cloudy. Lows 55 to
60. Highs around 85.
Obituary
Jovita Ortega
Pecos Enterprise
York M. "Smokey" Briggs, Publisher
Division of Buckner News Alliance, Inc.
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net
Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium.
Copyright 2002 by Pecos Enterprise
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