West Penn Power Outage leaves county offices and neighborhoods waiting on calmer winds
2026-03-14 00:49:26
The west penn power outage was not a single, isolated problem on Friday afternoon. In Westmoreland County, even the Westmoreland County Courthouse lost electricity, going dark shortly after 3 p. m. and coming back at 4: 15 p. m. Across the region, high wind gusts pushed outages into the thousands, as utilities and emergency dispatchers tracked downed trees and power lines.
Westmoreland County Courthouse and the short window without power
The courthouse outage put a public building at the center of a fast-moving weather event. Power went out shortly after 3 p. m. and returned at 4: 15 p. m., a tight span that still reflected how quickly the day’s conditions were changing in Westmoreland County.
By 5 p. m., the broader picture was sharper: just more than 5, 800 West Penn Power and Duquesne Light customers in Westmoreland and Allegheny counties were without power. The split showed how widely the damage and disruptions spread, with about 1, 500 West Penn Power customers and nearly 4, 300 Duquesne Light customers in the dark at that time.
Reports of downed trees and power lines came in countywide in Westmoreland County, described by a 911 dispatcher as the afternoon unfolded. In Allegheny County, an emergency dispatcher declined to say whether the same was happening there, even as outages were counted in the thousands.
West Penn Power Outage crews face limits as wind gusts peak
The winds driving the outages reached measurable benchmarks across the area. A maximum wind gust of 52 mph was reported at Pittsburgh International Airport on Friday, with gusts reaching 60 mph at the Arnold Palmer Regional Airport in Latrobe. For repair crews, those numbers mattered beyond the forecast: West Penn Power’s crews are not able to operate bucket truck equipment for outage remediation when wind speeds are higher than 40 mph.
West Penn Power spokesperson Lauren Siburkis said the company’s meteorologists are monitoring conditions. She said crews were positioned across the territory for a quick response, calling it an “all-hands effort” supported by contractor crews, with staggered staffing intended to ensure a 24/7 response to outages.
Still, the day’s winds were tied to a low pressure system moving into the area from across the Great Lakes. Liana Lupo, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service Pittsburgh office in Moon Township, said the higher-than-usual winds were expected to die down by Friday evening, with winds easing gradually over the weekend and into the overnight hours.
Pittsburgh-area outages climb as High Wind Warning remains in effect
By Friday evening, the broader Pittsburgh-area impact came through in a series of damage reports and outage counts. Multiple communities were under a High Wind Warning until midnight, and thousands of power outages were reported as trees tore down wires. At the last check in the evening update, nearly 70, 000 power outages were being worked on across the area.
Several specific incidents illustrated the kinds of calls that can accompany widespread outages. A tree fell onto a house on the 1300 block of Ingham Street in Marshall-Shadeland. A light pole was blown down on the Boulevard of the Allies in Pittsburgh. In Shaler Township, police said Vilsack Road was closed as crews made repairs to downed wires and a tree that was blown over.
The forecast offered both near-term relief and a reminder that the wind risk was not finished. Lupo said winds may reach between 30 and 35 mph overnight and 20 to 25 mph on Saturday, with gusts possibly picking back up between 30 and 35 mph on Sunday afternoon. Temperatures on Saturday were expected to rise from 32 in the morning to the mid to upper 40s. Light snow showers were forecast for Sunday, though Lupo said they would not result in measurable snowfall, and temperatures could reach into the 60s Sunday afternoon before a cold front moves through Pittsburgh Monday, dropping temperatures back down to the 30s.
For now, the west penn power outage story sits at the intersection of weather and response time: outages tallied at 5 p. m., wind gusts measured at major airports, and the practical limits of what crews can do when gusts top 40 mph. By the time electricity returned to the Westmoreland County Courthouse at 4: 15 p. m., the region was still counting customers without service, waiting for winds to ease enough for repairs to keep pace.
