Over-voltage caused fire - JCP&L does nothing

Edit: A few hours after I posted this, our power is back to normal thanks to a lovely line crew all the way from Tennessee. We finally got attention from the power company thanks to the relentless efforts from Councilman Warren Gisser and the Mendham Emergency Management. Thank you!

On Saturday 3/3, just as the storm had begun to calm down, we noticed our lights were flickering, but didn't think much of it, since we knew the electric grid had been damaged. Later that morning, while I was out trying to clean up fallen trees, my son told me he smelled something burning. I felt a faint smell of burned plastic and investigated. We couldn't find the source and I kept working in the yard.

A loud pop

The lights kept on flickering throughout the day, especially when we ran a heavy electric load, but we continued to assume it had to do with the grid struggling a bit. I needed to get some lumber from Home Depot and I suggested we make it a family trip just to get out of the house. Just as we were preparing to leave, my son heard a loud pop and said he smelled smoke. I ran down into the basement to check and found the surge protector in my office on fire. I tried to put it out, but the smoke from the burning plastics and electronics made it impossible to breath. Within minutes, the entire basement and ground floor was filled with toxic smoke. Luckily, the Mendham Emergency Management people showed up quickly and were able to put the fire out before it had spread. Unfortunately, my office, which I use for my daily work, is not useable and there's extensive smoke damage.

Dangerous Voltage

Once we were let back into our house, I hooked up a voltmeter to an outlet to try to understand what had caused the fire. It showed 160V, far higher than the normal 120V that's supposed to come out of our outlets. When I turned on big appliances, the voltage spiked to close to 200V, almost twice the normal level! I started examining our electrical equipment and found that four surge protectors were partially melted and both of our boilers were damaged and not functioning. We had dodged a bullet. What if more surge protectors had caught fire? What if we had left the house as we planned with our dogs still there? These questions are still haunting us!

Trying to Get Help

Since our problem went beyond just loss of power, we assumed that JCP&L would give us a priority, considering that this was a hazardous condition. Instead, we were put in the normal queue and given an estimate of about a week. Later that night, I received a note on my door from JCP&L that they couldn't find a problem and that it was probably in faulty wiring my house. This was without having contacted me to let me explain the problem. To have our wiring checked, I called an electrician who found it to be in perfect condition. He also urged us to leave the main breaker off, since over-voltages are a very dangerous condition. So we got ready to get by without power and wait for someone from JCP&L to show up.

A Glimmer of Hope

On 3/9, our case with the the power company finally got an estimated date. They were going to restore service the day after (3/10)! Waiting patiently while watching the case on the JCP&L website, it finally happened! The site showed "Crews dispatched". It felt like winning the lottery. I walked outside to greet them and show them the issue. After waiting for about an hour, I checked our case again. It was gone! I called JCP&L and was informed that a crew had been on site and "cleared up some debris". I never saw a crew, nor did whatever they did (or didn't do) solve the problem.

Growing Desperate

Now on day 8 with a dangerous condition at our home, we started growing desperate. My wife sent an email to the fire chief and some elected town officials. They promised to look into the issue and one of the council members told us they had been in contact with JCP&L who promised to send a truck right away. Finally, our cries for help would be heard!

Broken Promises

At the time of writing this, 15 hours has passed since JCP&L promised to send us a crew. No sign of a crew and no improvement of our situation. At this point, virtually all of Mendham has had their power restored. We are obviously put very last in line, even though we've experienced life-threatening conditions due the poor quality of the power delivered to our house. We have exhausted all avenues and in desperation I'm turning to media to try to get some attention. We have two kids (one with a physical handicap) and I hope someone will see our pleas for help!

Getting Technical

According to multiple electricians I've talked to, our issues are most likely caused by a loose neutral wire. In the power grid, the neutral wire is responsible for feeding back unbalanced power and keeping a reference of zero volts to stabilize voltages in the various circuits. A loose or badly connected neutral wire will cause voltages to vary wildly and can cause the voltage in outlets to go as low as 40V and as high as 200V. In fact, loose neutral wires is one of the most common causes for electrical fires in America. Yet, JCP&L has chosen to ignore this problem at our house.