Squirrel Raccoon Responsible for North Adams, Rte. 2 Outage

Staff ReportsiBerkshires
12:03PM / Sunday, April 03, 2011Print Story | Email Story

Update: The North Adams Transcript reported on Friday, April, 8, 2011, that last weekend's power outage was caused by a raccoon. We'd heard that, too, and specifically asked the spokesman about it but were given the answer of squirrel. According to a different National Grid spokesman, the Transcript was told the raccoon "was able to get around the barriers and into the higher voltage area."

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — A squirrel is responsible for the power outage on Saturday night that left some 1,400 customers in North Adams in the dark for nearly two hours, including Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts.

National Grid spokesman David Graves said a squirrel got into a substation on Walker Street and damaged a piece of equipment. Some 28 customers in Clarksburg near the substation and another 410 along Route 2 in Florida were also affected. Power was restored at 11:27 p.m.

"All substations are equipped with anti-animal protections but squirrels can get into just about anywhere they want to go to get to a food source," said Graves.

The nosy critters are frequent disruptors of power service and have an uncanny ability to get into places they don't belong. A Google search on "squirrels power outages" returned 241,000 results in 0.14 seconds. A 2007 USA Today article (cutely named "Suicide squirrels driving utilities nuts") says the acrobatic rodents cost utitilies millions every year in equipment and manpower.

Three weeks ago, an errant crow apparently caused an arc at a substation in Greylock that cut off power to 7,000 customers in the city's West End and along Route 7 south on Saturday morning.

North Adams East End, Route 2 In The Dark
10:16PM / Saturday, April 02, 2011

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Nearly 2,000 National Grid customers are out of power in sections of the city and as far east as Drury along Route 2.

Power went out about 9:45 p.m. on Saturday; several customers on the east side of the city reported hearing a loud bang before the lights went out. National Grid's website says power is not expected to be back on until midnight. No further information was immediately available; if our readers have any information they are welcome to post here or at Facebook.com/iBerkshires.

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Your Comments

iBerkshires.com welcomes critical, respectful dialogue. Name-calling, personal attacks, libel, slander or foul language is not allowed. All comments are reviewed before posting and will be deleted or edited as necessary.

More and more, iberkshires is the place to go for the best current local news coverage. Reminds me of WNAW back in the day when the late Don Thurston still owned it and Ron Plock was the chief news hound. Good job!
from: good coverage	on: 04-03-2011 05:08AM I Agree (21) - I Disagree (0)

How is this good covereage? It says nothing. I was happy to see something was said about the outage, but this says nothing. Waste of my time even looking.
from: really?	on: 04-03-2011 10:59AM I Agree (3) - I Disagree (19)
Editor: The point was to let people known what was happening on Saturday night and when it would be fixed. I've just updated with cause. Readers have to keep in mind that we have a tiny staff and we're often working during our time off on these types of stories.
I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)

Who is this really person??? I didn't even know about a power outage until I saw it on iBerkshires. It is called knowledge, no matter how much you get...it's knowledge
from: YOU TRY TO DO BETTER	on: 04-03-2011 11:27AM I Agree (17) - I Disagree (1)

I just would like to thank the staff a iBerkshires.com, you all do a wonderful job, and when I want to see what is going on I go to you first. The Transcript and The Eagle usually are a few days behind you... again thanks for a great job. It was great to get on the computer last night after the power was back and find out something that was going on. again thanks for a job well done
from: native	on: 04-03-2011 01:18PM I Agree (22) - I Disagree (0)

Iberkshires was very quick to report the outage. Kudos to you. Officers were quickly dispatched by their Sergeant to concentrate patrol in effected areas to deter criminal activity an render any assistance to NA residents. I did the same for Clarksburg. You keep up the good job Iberkshires.
from: Art Barbeau	on: 04-03-2011 01:26PM I Agree (18) - I Disagree (2)
Editor: Thanks for the information Art. That's the kind of news our readers like to know.
I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)

I was looking around to try and find out what had caused the outage. A general search online did not come up with any answers. I checked the transcript online, of course, no answers. I was just about to log off and then I remembered your coverage of the business fire on rt 8 a little while ago. I looked and there it was. The information that I wanted was only available on iberkshires.com thankyou all (reporters, investigators and staff)
from: John	on: 04-03-2011 02:15PM I Agree (12) - I Disagree (0)

I'm a really also. I appreciate iberkshires, and call them first with anything I feel is newsworthy.
from: really	on: 04-03-2011 06:10PM I Agree (9) - I Disagree (2)

Great Job covering story.. You always have to have one jerk in the bunch..
from: Opinions differ	on: 04-04-2011 10:08AM I Agree (9) - I Disagree (1)

This is right up iberkshires alley. A story like this is about all their small minded staff can handle! They can't get obituries right, even when directly copying them from the Transcript. So why would they have any better news stories than a squirle?! I'll stick to real newspeople for my information.
from: Zander's Mom	on: 04-04-2011 04:00PM I Agree (0) - I Disagree (10)

I live along route 2 and my power was out. It wasn't until I just read this article that I found out why. I have looked in the papers but didn't see anything. Thanks for posting. Regardless of the size of the story or information, you guys do a great job. I like to know about the little things that happen in our area not just the big things!
from: Murray Ave Resident	on: 04-07-2011 04:23PM I Agree (1) - I Disagree (0)

FYI it was a raccoon, not a squirrel.
from: seems like..	on: 04-08-2011 06:30PM I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)
Editor: I specifically asked the National Grid spokesman if it was a raccoon and he said no. Who said it was a raccoon?
I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)

National Grid. Transcript did a second article at the end of this week. National Grid corrected themselves.
from: seems like...	on: 04-09-2011 09:44AM I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)
Editor: I see it. For heaven's sake, you think they would let us know since we called them first. I'll update the story. Thanks for pointing that out.
I Agree (0) - I Disagree (0)

North Adams Becomes a Purple Heart Community

By Jack GuerinoiBerkshires Staff
05:16AM / Tuesday, August 11, 2026

Veterans Service Officer Kurtis Durocher, a Purple Heart recipient, tells his own story of how he was wounded in Iraq.

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — City leaders last week held a ceremony marking the city as a Purple Heart Community to honor local military service members wounded or killed in combat.

"This designation is much more than a sign that will stand at the entrances to our city," said Kurtis Durocher, Northern Berkshire veterans service officer at City Hall on Friday. "It is a lasting commitment and a promise to this community. We'll never forget the sacrifices made by those who are wounded or killed while serving our nation. It is a public declaration of the courage and sacrifices of combat wounded. Veterans will always have a place of honor here in North Adams."

As a Purple Heart Community, North Adams will place signs throughout the city acknowledging the designation. The city will also hold a ceremony every Aug. 7 on National Purple Heart Day.

During the inaugural ceremony, Durocher said he was asked by the Military Order of the Purple Heart to find a keynote speaker for the event, preferably a Purple Heart recipient. But he was unable to find someone willing to speak. With the date approaching, he decided to tell his own story.

"I don't like standing up and telling my own personal story ... But I realized, in my position as a VSO, I get so many ... children of veterans who will say, 'I didn't know anything about my father until after he passed because he just didn't talk about it,'" Durocher said. "... I have been that way until I've gotten into this position, and so, now, I try to tell my story as much as I can when it is brought to me."

Durocher served in the Army for 20 years and retired as a master sergeant. On Friday, he recalled a time early in his career while serving in the 82nd Airborne Division deploying to Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom. On Sept. 12, 2003, his squad was conducting a patrol on Route Irish in Baghdad. He was serving as a gunner on an LMTV when it was struck by a 155-millimeter artillery shell. He said the explosive had been hidden behind a guardrail and detonated using nothing more than a washing machine timer.

"In an instant, everything changed. The blast knocked me unconscious. When I regained consciousness, I instinctively was removing my helmet," he said. "Almost immediately my training took over. We had been taught repeatedly that attacks like this were often followed by a secondary attack or an ambush. I quickly put my helmet back on and began searching for my machine gun."

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