New Day in Puerto Rico
IBEW Charters Local for Island's Utility Workers

Powering Up in Canada
Organizing Push
Gets Results

'Erie Canal Moment'
$100B Plant Coming
to N.Y.

North of 49°
IBEW, CN Forge a
New 3-Year Agreement

Au nord du 49° parallèle
La FIOE et le CN concluent une nouvelle convention collective de 3 ans

Bruce McFadden

Thomas J. Finnell and Frederick J. Heizelman

NEAP Summary
Annual Report

NEAP Benefit Notice

STORM SURGE
IBEW Members Rush to Help
After Hurricane Ian's Wrath

Linemen who have seen Mother Nature at her worst couldn't believe their eyes in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian.

Entire neighborhoods on barrier islands gone, washed into the Gulf Coast of Florida by Ian's epic storm surge. Homes and shops and restaurants leveled by 150 mph winds or devoured by floodwaters. Cars and boats scattered and smashed as if a giant toy box had fallen from the sky.

"I've worked quite a few storms, but this last one, I've never seen devastation like it," said Kellen Lewis of West Palm Beach Local 1191, describing the scene on Estero Island, home to Fort Myers Beach. "The pictures don't do it justice. You have to see it in person to really grasp what happened there."

Ian slammed into southwestern Florida just shy of a Category 5 hurricane the afternoon of Sept. 28, making its way to the Carolinas two days later, weaker but still vicious. With more than 100 people confirmed dead, it was Florida's most lethal storm in 90 years and the nation's second-deadliest this century, after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

The storm cut power to at least 2 million customers, drawing more than 46,000 utility workers from at least 33 states to Florida and another 12,000 to the Carolinas and Virginia, the Edison Electric Institute reported.

They worked to exhaustion 16 hours a day, seven days a week, wading into the nastiest of muck in the stickiest of air, catching what shuteye they could in bunk beds or hammocks or wounded hotels.

Among the IBEW stalwarts were Floridians who'd been dealt as much misery as their neighbors.

"We had members who lost their homes or had extensive damage, up to four feet of water," said Jack Wilson, business manager at Utility System Council 4 in Florida. "They went in and stripped the drywall and interior so their homes could dry out, and then they went to work to help everyone else."

Stephenson:
Standing Up for
Democracy
Cooper:
The Future Is Ours

Timothy Bowden;
Daniel D. Melloway

Pennsylvania Locals Get Apprenticeship Funding;
New PLA Spells Steady Work for Hundreds of IBEW Members in Ga., S.C.

Organizing CWs and CEs Helps Louisiana Local
Boost IBEW Reputation, Market Share

Nebraska Local Helps Manufacturing Plant Get $70 Million Investment;
Record-Breaking Building in Milwaukee

A Texas-Size Thank You

October 2022

Boston Local Swears In Its
Most Diverse Apprentice Class Yet