Loud bangs and power outage: Fire department declares special situation!

Loud bangs and power outage: Fire department declares special situation!

On Wednesday evening at 10:19 p.m. the calm in Bensen quickly ended. Loud bangs pierced the darkness and a power outage caused commotion in several villages. Short circuits and hot arcs were noticeable at Osterbeeke, where there is a substation. “It sounded like someone was hitting a car with a sledgehammer,” says Jürgen Battermann, deputy city fire chief, describing the noise during the operation of the Bensen and Haddessen fire departments. Fortunately, only a little smoke was visible and no extinguishing work was necessary as an extinguishing system in the transformer station was probably activated.

The city fire chief Tobias Ebbighausen reacted immediately and declared a special situation. The lighthouse concept was activated, meaning that the volunteer firefighters in the fire stations were available as a contact point for citizens. “In the event of longer power outages, it is important that people know where they can go,” said Ebbighausen. The region has already experienced several power outages in the past year, similar to the one in March when a fire at a gravel factory site endangered seven elderly people in a retirement home. At that time, the fire department stepped in and provided the patients with an emergency generator.

Preparations and contact points

Power outages are no longer uncommon, and future interruptions can also be expected, as the fire department's experience shows. In Kleinostheim there is a specially designed lighthouse concept for this purpose, in which fire stations serve as the primary contact points. There, citizens can seek help and make emergency calls in the event of a power outage, even if permanently installed telephones may fail. This is particularly important because both landlines and cell phones can be affected by power outages.

The emergency contact points in Kleinostheim are organized as follows:

• Reinhard-Heraeus-Ring / Lindigstraße
• Parkplatz Hamburger Str. / Bereich Königsberger Str.
• Feuerwehrhaus / Industriestr. 11
• Kirchplatz
• Im Wingert / Strietwaldstr.

Thanks to the lighthouses, which are usually designed in the form of fire station houses, the communities have taken precautions so that they can react quickly in the event of a crisis. These buildings are highly visible and easy to reach, allowing citizens to quickly find help. Information on current situations is communicated via loudspeaker and radio announcements as well as through social media in order to inform people in a timely manner.

Although the municipal utilities were initially unable to tell the fire department exactly where the power was out, the all-clear was given at 11:12 p.m. Thanks to quick switchovers by the Hameln-Weserbergland municipal utility, power was quickly restored in all affected areas. However, the local fire brigades had the situation well under control and were ready to provide support in an emergency.