Mississippi Power trains first responders on electrical hazards
For more than 30 years, Mississippi Power has worked with first responders across South Mississippi to help them recognize, understand and avoid electrical hazards.
Over the past two weeks, Risk Management and Claims Specialist Archie Reeves – who has been teaching the class for 11 years – held the workshop for the Biloxi Fire Department. The course includes a Safety City demonstration and discussions on down wires, generator safety, back feeding and meter recognition.
“Our goal is to keep everyone safe,” said Reeves. “We work to keep emergency responders informed so they can better protect the public and themselves.”
The Biloxi Fire Department, one of the largest on the Coast, has nine stations and firefighters must attend the course in shifts. Firefighters, just like line crews, have to make certain there are enough of them on the job and available to respond when needed.
“The company provides the class as a service to the community,” Reeves said. “When a municipality requests the course, we’re ready. We’ve also taught the course to volunteer fire departments, police departments and sheriff’s departments. It’s a great way to share best practices.
“When you consider the possibility of how those lessons could get paid forward, it’s a given we’ll do our part to help first responders stay safe.”
The course also covers the fundamentals of electricity, electric utility systems and best practices to follow when responding to fires involving electric lines and equipment.
“Following our discussion on meters and breakers, there was a question about how to tell if a digital meter is live,” said Reeves. “That was a really good question and it came from an experienced firefighter.”
One of the main takeaways from the course is to treat every downed line as if it’s energized, which is sound advice for everyone.
Mississippi Power, a subsidiary of Southern Company (NYSE: SO), produces safe, reliable and environmentally responsible energy for more than 187,000 customers in 23 southeast Mississippi counties. With nearly 160 megawatts of approved solar energy capacity, Mississippi Power is the largest partner in providing renewable energy in the state of Mississippi. Visit our website at mississippipower.com, like us on Facebook, and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
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