– 0% of Columbia out 0 customers out in New York

Power outage history

Columbia County New York

17hours

without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025

7th most of 62 in New York 2.6× the national median

Worst outage on record Sep 8, 2023 66% of customers out · 90% back in 42 hours

Hours without power, average customer per year 17h / yr State average 4.3 h · national median 6.6 h

Major outages a year 4.5 Peaks over 10% of customers or 50,000 customers

Typical time to restore 90% 13hours Median across major outages, from the peak

Longest single outage 3.5days Mar 2, 2018, over 1% of customers out

Outage hours on storm days 86% Share falling on days with a NOAA storm report here

Worst year 2023 35 hours without power, average customer

Electricity customers 30,817 ORNL customer model · 8 well-covered years

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 Columbia's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.

20152016201720182019202020212022202320242025

0%100% of customers out

Year by year

Hours in the dark, per customer

2023 was the worst well-recorded year, at 35 hours for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.

Columbia, hours without power per customer

ColumbiaUS median countyNew York average

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
Sep 7, 2023	Thunderstorms	20,477	66%	2.0 d	42 h	546k
Mar 2, 2018	Winter storm	13,447	44%	3.5 d	2.5 d	481k
Mar 14, 2023	Winter storm	14,161	46%	2.6 d	2.2 d	371k
Oct 7, 2020	Thunderstorms	8,964	29%	2.0 d	41 h	214k
Nov 20, 2016	Winter storm	8,266	27%	2.5 d	2.1 d	161k
Apr 3, 2024	Winter storm	4,677	15%	2.1 d	29 h	118k
Aug 4, 2020	Hurricane Isaias	8,987	29%	46 h	23 h	101k
Mar 23, 2024	Winter storm	8,654	28%	28 h	19 h	101k
Feb 4, 2022	Ice storm	7,768	25%	23 h	18 h	100k
May 5, 2017	Windstorm	7,023	23%	30 h	22 h	98k
Jul 2, 2020	Thunderstorms	7,305	24%	25 h	16 h	95k
Jul 16, 2024	Thunderstorms	3,376	11%	2.1 d	2.0 d	84k
Oct 31, 2019	Windstorm	4,228	14%	41 h	30 h	76k
Jan 13, 2024	Windstorm	3,663	12%	38 h	30 h	68k
Apr 16, 2018	Windstorm	3,512	11%	35 h	31 h	67k
Jun 29, 2021	Thunderstorms	13,758	45%	18 h	7.0 h	63k
Aug 9, 2024	Hurricane Debby	5,653	18%	27 h	22 h	58k
Aug 13, 2016	Thunderstorms	3,398	11%	26 h	21 h	53k
Aug 8, 2019	Thunderstorms	5,633	18%	21 h	19 h	44k
Jan 16, 2022	No storm report	15,149	49%	3.8 h	3.2 h	42k
Jul 4, 2023	Thunderstorms	4,560	15%	21 h	8.8 h	34k
Oct 30, 2017	Windstorm	2,342	8%	34 h	25 h	34k
Jan 9, 2024	Windstorm	2,008	7%	24 h	8.0 h	34k
Jul 13, 2023	Thunderstorms	3,703	12%	23 h	19 h	33k
Mar 1, 2021	Windstorm	3,676	12%	19 h	9.2 h	29k
Jul 12, 2022	Thunderstorms	7,556	25%	16 h	5.5 h	28k
Dec 25, 2020	Windstorm	2,858	9%	19 h	15 h	26k
Jul 19, 2015	Thunderstorms	3,506	11%	18 h	15 h	24k
May 15, 2020	Thunderstorms	1,444	5%	18 h	–	19k
Sep 6, 2018	Thunderstorms	5,134	17%	12 h	11 h	19k

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 Columbia from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.

Thunderstorms 35%
Winter storm 31%
No storm on record 15%
Windstorm 11%
Tropical storm 4.5%
Ice storm 2.7%
Heat 1.7%

Who keeps the lights on

Utilities serving Columbia

As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole New York territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.

Utility	Type	Outage min / yr	Excl. major storms	Outages / yr	Residential ¢/kWh	Customers
Niagara Mohawk Power Corp.	Investor Owned	242	140	1.39	19.9	1.5M
New York State Elec & Gas Corp	Investor Owned	302	146	1.85	22.6	794k
Central Hudson Gas & Elec Corp	Investor Owned	290	182	1.50	27.7	271k

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.

Next door

Neighbouring counties

Ulster 17 h
Columbia (this county) 17 h
Greene 15 h
Dutchess 12 h
Rensselaer 8.9 h
Albany 5.8 h
Berkshire, MA 3.3 h

Across New York

Where it is darkest

Hours / yr64+

All New York counties →

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 30,817 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 →