An area power outage on Monday morning affecting 790 customers in Ferndale was caused by "equipment failure," according to DTE Energy spokesman Scott Simons.

The outage was mostly resolved by early afternoon, but a DTE power outage map late Monday night showed 70 customers in other areas of the city without power.

Simons could not be more specific about what type of equipment failure caused the outage but said the system has been working well considering the unusually high temperatures.

"This is the first [larger] outage this summer and after almost two weeks of 90-degree temperatures, the system has been working very well," he said Monday afternoon. "We have had isolated situations where there have been power outages but it's not strictly Ferndale that's experiencing this."

New substation planned

Last month, DTE representatives gave an update on the power situation in Ferndale and on plans to put a new substation in the city.

DTE Energy Supervising Engineer Ron Gerkin told council members that power in the city has been more reliable with recent improvements made to the system such as tree-trimming and pole-top maintenance.

"The reliability of Ferndale and the area has been much better. It hasn't been perfect but we haven't lost entire substations and the times that we have had outages they've been relatively quickly fixed," Gerkin said in June. "We don't foresee [last summer's incident] happening this summer."

A new substation is in the works to help service new growth in the area but is expected to take about one and a half to two years to complete. Read the full article here.

Simons said anyone concerned about power outages in their area can call DTE at 1-800-477-4747.

Have you been affected?

Some Patch readers have expressed frustration with frequent power outages and others have said they fear a repeat of last summer's seven large outages between June 2 and Nov. 14.

Patch reader Faith wrote: "Mine went out around 5:30 am but came back on in about an hour. I am on W. Chesterfield. Getting a little sick of our area being the area that keeps getting hit with this. Second time in a week and a half."

Another reader, Nick, wrote on Facebook: "We shouldn't have to sacrifice if DTE would actually update the infrastructure in the area instead of limping it along. My Dad still lives out in the farmland suburbs near Orion Rd and Adams, north of Rochester. Growing up, on a dirt road, we never lost power as much as it's been gone the last two [years in] Ferndale."