In a flooding event (i.e. hurricane, etc.), do officials preemptively shut off electricity to prevent electrocution from downed power lines? If not, how don’t people get injured?

Question

In a flooding event (i.e. hurricane, etc.), do officials preemptively shut off electricity to prevent electrocution from downed power lines? If not, how don’t people get injured?

In: Earth Science

Answer 1

There are a lot of “no” answers, but in reality it varies. In my hometown they have turned off the power for significant flooding if the situation called for it. For non-destructive flooding the city turned off power to reduce the chance of damage to the system form water so it could be turned on quicker after the flooding (wasn’t expected to last long). During a hurricane they tend to give people as much time as possible with power because the storm is likely to break lines and kill power anyway.

Those reasons may not be 100 percent accurate, but its how it was explained to me when they did cut power.