Linemen Glad to Help in Carolina, Happy to Be Home

Five linemen from Jackson Purchase Energy who recently returned from the Carolinas to help restore power after Hurricane Matthew brought home stories, mementos, and the satisfaction of a job well done.

Greg Vied, Shane Humphrey, Cody Byassee, Jimmy Johnson and Darryl Corn left Paducah on October 9 and returned on Thursday. They spent three days helping restore electricity for Central Electric in Sanford, North Carolina, and nine days for Santee Electric Cooperative in the area of Florence, South Carolina.

One of the men at Santee Electric recognized the trucks when they pulled into the parking lot, according to JPEC President and CEO Dennis Cannon. That's because he was in Paducah after the 2009 ice storm, and stayed for 27 days to help.

"(It was) a little more gratifying being able to help return to favor, and go back and help the ones in need after they helped us," Johnson said.

Vied added that the two crews from Santee were the last ones to leave Paducah in 2009, and JPEC was the last crew from a cooperative to leave the hurricane-damaged area last week. Cannon said that's a testimony to his men, "because they worked hard and did a good job."

They returned from working 18-20 hour days, knowing they helped make a difference, but were quick to deflect praise to the ones who stayed here while they were gone. All of the men are married, but only about six weeks for Vied, while Byassee's wife is expecting their first child.

Humphrey said, "We're there taking care of the lines. We've got people taking care of us, but nobody's taking care of our home. My wife still had to take care of everyday business - kids going to school, laundry, everything - without me there. That, to me is the real heroes of all of this."

The men stayed in a hotel while working in North Carolina, and at a church parsonage that had been converted into a "kid's church" in South Carolina. Another church fed them lunch each day, and it was closer to where they were actually working, so they wasted less time driving back and forth. Their host church fed them dinner each night, and surprised them with thank you cards and a poster made by the children during a Sunday School class. 

Vied said one day in South Carolina a family walked up the road to where they were working and asked if they could help them get power restored that day. He told them the work needed at their mobile home was more involved than what they had been sent to do, but one family member was persistent.

"We was telling lots of people, 'We can't do that today. Maybe tomorrow.' Then about 20 minutes later, this lady comes walking down. She explained to me that her Grandmother had passed away the night before," Vied said. 

She told him that the Grandfather was too frail to got to the funeral home, and they wanted the family to come back to the house, but they had no electricity. Vied said she continued to ask for someone to help, and he decided to take one more look at the situation. Vied figured out a way to disconnect a downed line and run a temporary feed to the woman's house. 

Vied said, "She was waiting out in the road. I said, 'We'll get you on. You do whatever you have to do to have your family come out here. You'll have lights in a few minutes.'"

He said he gets more gratitude out of those single-home situations, because it's more personal than re-connecting a line that supplies power to 300 people that he'll never see. Vied said sometimes it takes doing something that's outside protocol.

"You can't turn people down like that, You have to do what you can do to get them on," Vied said.

In their specialized line of work, the men said they also see lots of households that rely on constant electricity for more than lights, TV or freezers. Home health equipment ranging from CPAP or BiPAP machines to patients who constantly need oxygen due to lung or heart problems.

Last Wednesday night in South Carolina, the men returned to the host church earlier than normal - before Wednesday night services ended - so they stayed outside with their trucks. Vied said once people started leaving, they saw the men for the first time all week, and began honking their horns in tribute and gratitude as they left.

Vied said, "That kind of made us feel good. The only time I ever get to be a hero is when there is a storm, when I get people's lights on. So you get a little gratitude out of it. A little reward. The paycheck is not always the reward. Money's nice, but, like that lady, I was just glad I could help her."