About Is The Power Out?
When the power goes out, the first thing everyone wants to know is simple: is it just me, or is the whole block down? I live in the Tri-Cities, WA, I got tired of refreshing the utility map and scrolling Facebook to find out, so I built one place to answer the question.
Is The Power Out? is a free, crowdsourced power-outage map for Richland, Kennewick, Pasco and West Richland. The moment your power drops, you can drop a pin and see who else nearby is reporting the same thing. Scattered “is anyone else out?” posts turn into one clear, live picture.
How it works
Anyone can report an outage in about fifteen seconds, no account required. Nearby reports group together so a single outage shows up as one affected area instead of dozens of lonely pins. Each outage moves through a simple lifecycle: emerging, confirmed, restoring, and restored, with a color for each stage. When a utility posts an estimated restoration time, you see it right on the map.
For the power companies
Utilities and co-ops can claim an outage and post official status and ETAs straight to the public map, right where residents are already looking. If you run a utility, the utility console is for you.
A note on accuracy
This is a community project, not an official source. Reports are crowdsourced and unverified, and new submissions are screened automatically to keep out spam. Always confirm outage status and restoration times with your utility, and in an emergency, or to report a downed line, call 911.
Privacy
You can report completely anonymously. We never store your raw IP address, and photo location metadata is stripped on upload. An account is optional, it just lets you track your own reports and get alerts when outages hit near you.
Is The Power Out? is a community project I build and maintain under Omni Innovations LLC, here in the Tri-Cities. I build sites and tools like this one. If you need something built, reach out.