Jeff Preval is an award-winning anchor and reporter who joined the News 4 team in December 2021. See more of his work here.
Hundreds of residents lose power in South Buffalo
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BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Amid these hot and humid conditions, hundreds of people in South Buffalo lost power Wednesday and some are still without it.
National Grid tells News 4 about 700 people in South Buffalo lost power late Wednesday morning. Since then, about 500 people have had their power restored, but there are still homes and businesses that have gone much of the day with no power and no air conditioning.
Residents in the area of Eden Street and Downing Street off of South Park Avenue have been affected by this power outage. Initially, National Grid gave an estimated restoration time of about 4 p.m. Wednesday afternoon, but that's been pushed back to 8:15 p.m. Wednesday.
News 4 saw a National Grid crew on scene, looking to restore power. Jimmy's Auto Repair on South Park Avenue has been in the dark all day. They were working on cars, when all of a sudden everything inside stopped working, and have been unable to continue.
"We have a credit card machine as well, so you can't use the credit card machine for them to pay for their car because the machine's down because there's no power, so we're just kind of stuck," said Jimmy Barrett, the owner of Jimmy's Auto Repair. "I'm just waiting, hopefully the power will go on by the end of the day so they can all have their cars."
But Barrett knows that many customers will be disappointed, given the situation.
"I got all these cars, people waiting to get their cars picked up. I got no inspection machine because the power is out, I got no phone because the power is out. It hurts business, it's hard these days," Barrett said.
News 4 also met Robert Coniglio who called News 4 looking for information on when his power will be turned back on. He's been without power all day. He says he may stay with his sister for the night who has not been affected by the outage.
"It's about 100 degrees at least, I don't have a thermometer, but it's about 100 degrees [inside his home]," Coniglio said.
National Grid says the outage is all due to a piece of equipment failing and that it's not related to the excessive heat. Crews will continue to work throughout the evening to restore power.
News 4 will continue to monitor the situation through National Grid's Outage Map.