As the Valley prepares for the first monsoons of the season, Salt River Project is prepared to handle the heat and storms. SRP’s transmission, distribution, generation and planned energy purchases are equipped to serve the summer demand.

SRP plans for the summer heat and storms throughout the year by maintaining its transmission and distribution systems to ensure reliability. Crews have also replaced and added equipment when needed. Summer preparedness also includes preventative maintenance, tree trimming, pole reinforcement, cable replacement and storm planning for additional crews.

As SRP is prepared, it also has 6 monsoon summer safety tips:

  1. Be sure to fully charge mobile devices and tablets in case of an outage. Also, have flashlights, a battery-operated radio and a phone readily accessible, and check to make sure the batteries are good.
  2. Maintain a first-aid kit that includes your family’s prescription medications. Make sure items in the first-aid kit are in usable condition.
  3. Try to remain indoors during a storm. If caught outdoors, stay at least 100 feet from any downed power lines.
  4. Never try to help someone trapped by a power line. The line could be energized and endanger your own safety. Instead, immediately call 911 for help. Then call SRP’s emergency number, (602) 236-8811, to report the incident.
  5. If a power line hits your car while you are in it, stay inside the car until professional help arrives. If your vehicle catches fire and you must leave it, avoid making contact with the vehicle and the ground at the same time. Jump from the vehicle, landing with both feet together. Shuffle or hop away, keeping both feet in contact with each other until you are at least 100 feet from the vehicle. This may avoid making your body a ground path between energized and grounded areas or objects.
  6. Do not swim during a storm. Lightning can strike bodies of water.

In addition, a new mobile substation SRP recently added to the fleet to assist with any power needs that could come about from unexpected outages. This larger mobile unit has the ability to replace a distribution transformer should it need to be replaced or repaired, and is in addition to six existing mobile substations standing ready for summer duty. 

SRP alerts residential customers via email when their home is in an area where an outage has occurred as well as when the power has been restored. Customers can also sign up to receive outage notifications via text by calling SRP’s customer service center at (602) 236-8888 or through My Account, SRP’s online account management tool.

The SRP outage map – which provides details such as outage locations, how many customers are impacted, the outage start time, cause and the estimated time of restoration – is available on the web and on mobile devices at www.srpnet.com.