A tragic death inside a manhole left thousands of people and businesses in downtown Corpus Christi without power for almost 12 hours on Tuesday.
AEP employee Lee Wane died in a manhole outside the Corpus Christi Cathedral. The tragedy forced AEP Texas to shut down power to the area from the early afternoon until almost midnight.
Omar Lopez, director of corporate communications for AEP, explained why the grid was shut down.
"All of downtown is underground so it’s all one network. We don’t choose what parts to turn off. During the investigation, we turned it all off it was de-energized," Lopez said.
Lopez said the power was reactivated by 11:15 Tuesday night.
The outage turned the vibrant city into a dreary collection of empty streets and dormant lights Tuesday evening. Some area businesses were forced to shut down, while others relied on backup generators to keep the lights on.
Lopez says the investigation is ongoing, and he is not sure if that investigation will have any effect on the power grid moving forward.
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