LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Though Tuesday night’s hard winds inflicted a day’s-worth of trouble valley-wide Wednesday, one area, in particular, saw the grunt of its impacts.
NV Energy confirmed the winds blew down seven power poles on Atlantic between Oakey and Sahara, with even more blown down further north of the area.
Power pole lines in Zena Canreia’s backyard Wednesday morning (KLAS) 
NV Energy crews removing a blown down power pole over a playground at Varsity School Wednesday. (KLAS) 
One of seven power poles NV Energy say was blown down during Tuesday’s extreme winds along Atlantic between Oakey and Sahara.” (KLAS)
Zena Canreia said she heard a loud thud outside her window Tuesday night. It was a power pole landing in her backyard.
“I didn’t know what it was, so I was like, you know, I didn’t even want to come out here to check,” Canreia said outside her home Wednesday morning. “They’re wires. Anything can shock. Anything could happen.”
As NV Energy crews worked to remove the debris Wednesday, the two kids in her home were trapped inside.
“I didn’t want them to come outside because of the wires, and then, you know, the pole and how everything’s knocked down. That’s also why we couldn’t take them to school this morning,” Canreia said.
Those children joined hundreds of others kept home Wednesday as their schools were without power, CCSD parents told to 8 News Now. A CCSD representative says the decision to transition to distant learning was “due to extended restoration times and safety concerns for students and staff.”
8 News Now witnessed crews removing a power pole that nearly crashed on top of Variety School, within proximity of Sunrise Acres Elementary, Roy W. Martin Middle School, and Mission High School, which were also not operating in-person Wednesday.
Then, further south down Eastern, hundreds of others arrived at the doors of the Sahara DMV to find a power outage that shut it down. People with appointments 8 News Now spoke to Wednesday, some waiting nearly a month for this day, say they were not notified of the closure prior to arriving.
Pedro Martinez has taken off and on his license plates over the past two days. He says he didn’t have the proper registration paperwork on Tuesday and was directed to return Wednesday.
“I don’t want to waste too much energy on being pissed, because I already wasted plenty of energy trying to get all the documents together to get here, only to be disappointed again,” Martinez said while screwing back on his plates.
The DMV says it’s honoring Wednesday’s appointments on a walk-in basis until March 8.
NV Energy is unclear on how long it will take to restore all the power poles blown down. Late Wednesday night CCSD stated that three schools would continue distance learning on Thursday.
