Grand Junction – Waitresses in coats were serving cold lunches at some Horizon Drive restaurants, and homeowners were huddled around space heaters Monday as a gas outage left more than 2,000 customers without heat on the coldest day of winter.
The outage for Xcel customers was caused by frozen water vapor in a gas transmission line on Douglas Pass northwest of Grand Junction.
Xcel Energy spokesman Fred Eggleston said the problem in the frozen line was fixed in about three hours. But the company was scrambling to relight pilot lights on furnaces and water heaters in residential areas of Orchard Mesa, Clifton and north of Grand Junction. Some businesses on the Horizon Drive commercial district along Interstate 70, including Walker Field Airport, were affected.
The areas affected are at the end of transmission lines and thus lost the most pressure in their gas lines, Eggleston said.
Eggleston said 35 crews were en route to Grand Junction from other parts of the state Monday to help answer the 800 calls for restarting pilot lights.
Gas-company officials originally estimated some customers would be without heat until today, and a shelter was set up at a Grand Junction church. But Monday evening, Grand Junction Fire Department spokesman Mike Page said it appeared all homes and businesses would have gas service before today.
Shirley Ellerbee, manager of Coco’s Restaurant and Bakery on Horizon Drive, said they managed without gas service. “We stayed open, but it was very cold,” she said.
The outage came on a day when temperatures dropped to minus 8.
