Power outage history
Montgomery County Virginia
16hours
without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025
54th most of 123 in Virginia 2.5× the national median
Every day since 2015
Eleven years, one night at a time
Each cell is a day. The brighter it is, the larger the share of Montgomery's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.
Year by year
Hours in the dark, per customer
2025 was the worst well-recorded year, at 39 hours for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.
Montgomery, hours without power per customer
The record
The biggest outages since 2015
Ranked by customer-hours lost: customers out multiplied by how long they stayed out. Times are local.
| Began | Storm | Peak out | Share | Lasted | 90% restored | Customer-hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feb 12, 2025 | Winter storm | 22,393 | 69% | 5.6 d | 3.1 d | 887k |
| Mar 24, 2018 | Winter storm | 14,642 | 45% | 5.0 d | 3.0 d | 817k |
| Sep 27, 2024 | Windstorm | 4,846 | 15% | 3.2 d | 2.1 d | 149k |
| Jan 6, 2025 | Winter storm | 6,722 | 21% | 2.4 d | 27 h | 129k |
| Nov 15, 2018 | Ice storm | 3,484 | 11% | 2.1 d | 46 h | 83k |
| Feb 13, 2021 | Winter storm | 3,217 | 10% | 2.1 d | 46 h | 69k |
| Jun 17, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 3,503 | 11% | 45 h | 23 h | 60k |
| Dec 15, 2016 | No storm report | 3,343 | 10% | 28 h | 27 h | 59k |
| Apr 3, 2016 | Windstorm | 4,840 | 15% | 18 h | 8.2 h | 57k |
| Dec 23, 2022 | Windstorm | 2,992 | 9% | 39 h | 34 h | 52k |
| Mar 1, 2018 | Windstorm | 2,375 | 7% | 47 h | 38 h | 48k |
| Apr 8, 2020 | Thunderstorms | 5,593 | 17% | 27 h | 24 h | 48k |
| Apr 1, 2023 | Windstorm | 4,900 | 15% | 39 h | 21 h | 46k |
| Feb 20, 2019 | Winter storm | 2,143 | 7% | 44 h | 23 h | 32k |
| May 4, 2021 | Thunderstorms | 2,176 | 7% | 28 h | 25 h | 30k |
| Jul 13, 2015 | No storm report | 1,743 | 5% | 27 h | 22 h | 29k |
| Feb 18, 2021 | Winter storm | 3,007 | 9% | 29 h | 23 h | 24k |
| Feb 24, 2019 | Windstorm | 2,594 | 8% | 21 h | 16 h | 23k |
| Oct 20, 2018 | Windstorm | 2,581 | 8% | 17 h | 16 h | 22k |
| Mar 10, 2024 | No storm report | 1,798 | 6% | 26 h | 26 h | 21k |
| Mar 25, 2023 | No storm report | 1,949 | 6% | 23 h | 20 h | 20k |
| Aug 9, 2018 | Thunderstorms | 4,488 | 14% | 4.5 h | 4.0 h | 19k |
| May 26, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 923 | 3% | 24 h | – | 19k |
| Feb 15, 2015 | No storm report | 2,816 | 9% | 22 h | 16 h | 17k |
| Oct 23, 2021 | No storm report | 1,728 | 5% | 13 h | 13 h | 16k |
| Mar 1, 2017 | Thunderstorms | 1,547 | 5% | 26 h | – | 15k |
| May 17, 2019 | No storm report | 1,416 | 4% | 12 h | – | 15k |
| May 6, 2020 | No storm report | 2,948 | 9% | 6.8 h | 6.2 h | 14k |
| Jul 5, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 873 | 3% | 21 h | – | 14k |
| May 27, 2022 | No storm report | 1,142 | 4% | 24 h | – | 14k |
After the peak
How fast the lights come back
Each line is one major outage, from its peak. The amber line is the typical path.
When it happens
The outage clock
Customer-hours out by month (rings, January innermost) and local hour, 2018–2025.
What was happening
Weather behind the outages
Each outage is matched to NOAA storm reports for Montgomery from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.
- Winter storm 57%
- No storm on record 22%
- Windstorm 10%
- Thunderstorms 7.1%
- Ice storm 2.4%
- Tropical storm 0.8%
- Flooding 0.6%
Who keeps the lights on
Utilities serving Montgomery
As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole Virginia territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.
| Utility | Type | Outage min / yr | Excl. major storms | Outages / yr | Residential ¢/kWh | Customers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Appalachian Power Co | Investor Owned | 1,116 | 328 | 2.36 | 17.2 | 468k |
| City of Radford | VA | – | – | – | 12.1 | 73k |
| Craig-Botetourt Electric Coop | VA | 1,599 | 610 | 4.82 | 14.4 | 70k |
| Virginia Tech Electric Service | State | 27 | – | 0.17 | 18.4 | 5.8k |
EIA Form 861, latest year each utility reported. Outage minutes are SAIDI, the yearly minutes the average customer goes without power; outages a year are SAIFI.
About these numbers
Notes
Outages come from the EAGLE-I record of utility outage maps collected every 15 minutes by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Hours without power are customer-hours divided by the county's 32,573 electricity customers. Averages use well-covered years from 2018. Outages shorter than 15 minutes, and utilities that publish no outage map, are not in the record, so these figures understate the total. How every number is made →