Understanding the Salt River Outage Map

When the windstorm swept through our service area a year ago, it brought with it hundreds of outages that affected more than 25,000 members. And as those members sat and waited for our dedicated linemen and crews to show up, the spent plenty of time staring at our outage map, making sure their area was high-lighted and noted. For some, it wasn’t exactly the easiest graphic to understand. We heard plenty of these questions: “How do I read the outage map? ”What do the symbols mean? “Am I on the list?”

As we get ready for the spring weather and the storms it can bring, it’s a great time to go over our outage map, and how it can be useful for members if the lights go out.

Finding the map

While many of our members are familiar with our outage map, we still hear from some who don’t know where or how to find it. Luckily, it’s easy to access. On your phone or computer, you can find the outage map by going tooutage.srelectric.com. If you’ve downloaded our SR Electric mobile app, it’s even easier. Open the app, and without signing in, click the red “Menu” button at the bottom of the screen, where you’ll find a button labeled “Outage Map.”

Understanding the symbols

Once you’ve gotten to the map, a few tabs of information will pop up. At the top of your window, to the right of the question mark symbol, is a list of the various symbols and colors, and what they mean. They are:

If a hexagon has a number inside of it, that’s how many meters are affected by that particular outage. Many members get confused about the next symbol: the hard hat. Under normal conditions, it means that a crew has been assigned to the outage and is working to resolve the issue. In extreme situations, like we saw last March, the hard hat symbol means that a someone has been assigned, many times sent out to just diagnose the problem and determine the proper equipment needed to restore power. This happens during major storms when there can be wide-spread outages. Members can also find a county-by-county breakdown of outages and affected members and can even zoom in to their approximate location to see if their home is affected. Outages are never an enjoyable experience. But with a resource like Salt River Electric’s outage map, members have an important tool that can keep them informed, even if the lights go out.