An incident at Greenville House on Wednesday night, March 8, 2017, resulted in the evacuation of the building for three days and two nights, as the property had no electric service. 

Two pole-mounted transformers failed during a heavy wind storm, which in turn caused the large freestanding transformer next to the building to overheat and catch fire.  Damage to the building was kept to a minimum due to quick reactions by the site staff.  The main electric disconnects were shut off just prior to the large transformer’s failure, and the entire building was evacuated within two hours. 

The manager and maintenance staff were able to contact most residents’ emergency contacts and only 15 households had to be placed in local motels. The Red Cross,local churches, fire department, Greenville Hospital, and other local service providers all assisted in this evacuation.

Original estimates from Penn Power led us to expect the power outage to last at least a week.  Due to the team efforts of the site staff and home office personnel we were prepared to provide emergency heat to the building during the outage.  This became unnecessary as repairs to the transformers and wiring into the building were accomplished quickly and residents returned to their apartments late Friday afternoon, March 10, 2017.

The Greenville House staff performed admirably during this entire crisis, protecting both lives and property.  Excellent work by all involved!