Kootenai Electric lines hit by Avista crews

An Avista Utilities crew working near a construction site in Coeur d’Alene Tuesday dug into a Kootenai Electric Cooperative power line, causing a brief outage. The outage, reported at about 9:55 a.m., affected about 1,600 customers in the area near Ramsey Road and Hanley and Kathleen avenues, officials said. Power was restored within 30 minutes. Avista crews were aware of the location of Kootenai Electric’s lines, but some misinformation had crews about four feet in the wrong direction, said Jesse Wurst, Avista spokeswoman. “We called before we dug,” she said. Anyone planning on digging in any area should call 811 to locate underground gas and power lines, officials said.