Wyoming
Wyoming Senior Olympics featured in novel
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (Wyoming News Now) – The 2023 Wyoming Senior Olympics have been featured in a nationally selling novel. “Elli Dwyer’s Olympic Moment” by Diane Winger features the main character competing in the Wyoming Senior Olympics. Winger and her husband are Colorado residents and competed in last year’s Senior Olympics.
“We participated in the Wyoming Senior Olympics and it was a really cool experience and I said ‘OK, that definitely is going to be a major theme in in the book that I’m writing,’” Winger said.
Winger told Wyoming News Now that she was grateful that Wyoming still puts on the event. Colorado no longer has a “Senior Olympics” and games like the ones Wyoming puts on are disappearing across the country.
The weekend provides seniors a chance to not only compete but meet new people.
“Don’t don’t imagine that you can’t do it. If you’re interested in any of the many, many, many events, give it a try. Nobody’s going to make you feel embarrassed if you don’t do really well or you may surprise yourself and and win a medal,” Winger said.
The book is available for order on Amazon and Kindle. It can also be found at Winger’s website (https://wingerbooks.com).
The 2024 Wyoming Senior Olympics are right around the corner, they will be played in Cheyenne again from July 31 – Aug. 4th. Registration is open until July 20th. If you are interested you can register here.
Copyright 2024 KGWN. All rights reserved.
Wyoming
Wyoming authorities call on Rocky Mountain Power to explain role in massive November power outage
by Dustin Bleizeffer, WyoFile
The massive, multiple-utility power outage last fall that left some 250,000 customers across parts of Wyoming, South Dakota and Montana without electricity was the result of miscommunication and inadequate procedures during planned maintenance that required de-energizing a power line in southcentral Wyoming, according to a report.
The Nov. 13 incident left thousands of homes and businesses without power for 9.5 hours — longer, in some cases — and knocked out a coal-powered generator outside Glenrock. The unit at the Dave Johnston Power Plant remains offline, leaving Rocky Mountain Power to backfill some 300 megawatts of electricity — enough to power about 225,000 homes.
Without expressly assigning blame to any one party, the report — conducted by the Western Electricity Coordinating Council and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation — indicates a series of communication breakdowns between PacifiCorp (parent company of Rocky Mountain Power), the Western Area Power Administration and, to some degree, electrical grid coordinating teams.
While it’s unclear whether authorities such as the North American Electric Reliability Corporation might pinpoint fault and assess penalties, the Wyoming Public Service Commission has called on Rocky Mountain Power to appear at a hearing scheduled for 2:30 p.m. Wednesday. The commission wants to hear from the utility about “the specifics and details of the event and report,” a public notice announced, and it “may consider and take any action that is in the public interest.”
The hearing at the Public Service Commission’s office located at 2515 Warren Avenue, Suite 300, in Cheyenne, will also be livestreamed at this link.
What happened
According to the 49-page report published in June, PacifiCorp and the Western Area Power Administration were coordinating maintenance on their respective systems that, together, required temporarily de-energizing PacifiCorp’s Aeolus–Clover 500 kilovolt line, which runs east-west and is anchored, in part, by a substation near Medicine Bow.
The effort also required curtailing some local wind energy from feeding the grid, according to the report. But on the day of the planned maintenance, Nov. 13, there was confusion about whether the Western Area Power Administration would scrap its work, so wind energy wasn’t curtailed as originally planned.
” data-large-file=”https://i0.wp.com/oilcity.news/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Screenshot-2020-08-25-at-4.40.10-PM.png?fit=780%2C439&ssl=1″ alt=”” class=”wp-image-109941″/><figcaption class=)
Wind turbines near Cheyenne poke into a colorful sunrise in January 2025. (Tennessee Watson/WyoFile)
The report indicates that modeling tools might have failed to accurately measure local grid conditions, so when the power line was de-energized, “power flow rapidly redistributed throughout the northeast portion” of the local grid. “Within six seconds,” according to the report, “an electrical island formed and collapsed, causing widespread effects across that portion of the interconnection.
“The disturbance,” the report continues, “culminated in the loss of more than 4,800 [megawatts] of generation from coal, natural gas, photovoltaic and wind resources.”
The cascading power failure began at about 12:45 p.m. on a Thursday, dragging down portions of service territories operated by Rocky Mountain Power, Black Hills Energy, Montana-Dakota Utilities and some rural electric co-ops.
The report points to failures in communication, process deficiencies and inadequate modeling tools. Wind energy was not “identified as a contributing factor,” according to the report. It credits both battery storage and wind energy throughout the impacted area for supporting “a faster frequency recovery across the interconnection” and for providing “readily available capacity during system restoration.”
This article was originally published by WyoFile and is republished here with permission. WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.
Related
Wyoming
First Alert Weather Days through Sat. for excessive heat, possibly through Wednesday for fire danger
-
News28 minutes agoMexico files criminal complaints in US over migrant deaths in custody
-
Videos2 hours agoNew explosions near Iranian port cities, says state media | BBC News
-
Los Angeles, Ca2 hours agoBig rig crash spills cinder blocks on 101 Freeway; lanes blocked in Tarzana
-
Detroit, MI2 hours agoHow to watch ‘The Odyssey’ in IMAX, 70mm and more in metro Detroit
-
San Francisco, CA3 hours agoSold-Out SF Marathon 2026: The Races, Routes and Road Closures (Plus How to Watch It All) | KQED
-
Dallas, TX3 hours agoTop 10 Dallas Cowboys of 2026: Rashan Gary is Complete EDGE Dallas Needed
-
Miami, FL3 hours agoGirl, 12, shot while sitting in parked car in northwest Miami-Dade, deputies say
-
Boston, MA3 hours agoGBH Daily: Come sail away
