COLD SNAP: Wintery Weather Makes A Short Appearance

SEBRING - Progress Energy linemen worked through the cold weather Thursday to restore electricity to pockets of residents throughout the county without electricity.

Chad Demerre, lineman apprentice with Progress Energy, said small outages, affecting less than 200 customers, are common when the weather suddenly becomes cold.

"Everyone is turning on their heaters at the same time, and transformers become overloaded," said Demerre, who also said the repairs typically take one or two hours.

About 1,000 Sebring residents in the Harder Hall area lost power about 8:30 p.m. Thursday because of the failure of an underground cable. The outage lasted about 40 minutes and was not related to the cold weather.

Rick Ragland, lineman with Progress Energy, said a one-man crew responds first to an outage, and if he cannot fix it, a two-man team responds. With only two two-man teams in the county, Ragland said he expected to spend Thursday running from call to call Thursday.

"We are spread very thin right now," Ragland said as he prepared to replace a transformer in Orange Villa Senior Park.

Howard Robertson, who lives in Sebring Hills, realized he lost electricity about 4 a.m. Thursday, when he woke up in a cold house. He called Progress Energy and his electricity was restored within about five hours without too much of an inconvenience.

"We are very lucky to have something a lot of other people in Florida don't - a fireplace," Robertson said.

National Weather Service reports the low in Highlands County was 28 degrees, which was recorded in Avon Park. Sebring reached 32 degrees and Lake Placid dipped to 29 degrees. Temperatures remained at or below freezing about five hours in the early morning hours of Thursday.

Dick Swearingen, of Avon Park, woke up Thursday morning to find his three-tiered fountain completely frozen, with icicles hanging from its sides.

"I haven't seen ice like that since we moved here," said Swearingen, who is from Pennsylvania.

Dennis Thieme, of Sebring, had icicles hanging from the plants in his back yard, but he intentionally made them. Thieme watered his plants Wednesday night and Thursday morning, coating them with a layer of ice about one-inch thick, to protect them from the below-freezing temperatures.

"Ice never gets colder than 32 degrees, so as long as you keep the ice on there, the cold cannot harm the plants," Thieme said.

A papaya tree did not withstand the overnight lows, but the tomato, pineapple and desert rose plants in his back yard appeared healthy Thursday morning.

"And the tomato plants won't even lose a bloom," Thieme said.

Florida Citrus Mutual officials said the cold snap caused minimal damage to the citrus crop because temperatures did not dip low enough for long enough duration to create substantial problems.

"This is good news for growers, good news for consumers and good news for the state of Florida," said Michael W. Sparks, executive vice president/CEO of Florida Citrus Mutual. "Mother Nature cut us a break this time, and now we can continue to produce the quality citrus crop Florida is known for."