Wrangell Sentinel -

Power service went down to southern Southeast Alaska communities, following problems at the Swan Lake dam site on June 8.

The hydroelectric dam is one of two major producers utilized by Southeast Alaska Power Agency, primarily servicing the Ketchikan area. This year an effort is being made to raise the dam, a $10 million project which will increase active storage by 25 percent and yield between 6,000 and 12,000 megawatt hours annually.

A five-megawatt load bank being used during the project experienced a problem with its cooling circuit, which ended up tripping the system’s failsafe. Wran...