Everyday Heroes 2018

GEORGIA POWER
PHIL DUKE
LOCAL LINEMAN/TROUBLEMAN
By JAMES SIMPSON II
Journal Staff Writer
Before becoming an electricity lineman, Phil
Duke will admit that he didn’t know anything
about electricity, other than the basic stuff.
“I didn’t know anything about electricity
before Georgia Power, other than you plug
something in and it comes on,” said Duke. “I
didn’t know how much work goes into when
storms come or how many poles get broken a
week. We could have four or five poles break
a week from bad driving, trees falling, and
wrecks. I didn’t realize how much work goes
into keeping electrical systems going and how
much training goes into it.”
Born in Portland, Indiana, where he lived
for 20 years, Duke attended International
Business College in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Duke
then moved to Americus, Georgia in 2006
and worked at Caravelle Boat Group, LLC. He
then started to attend South Georgia Technical
College in Americus, where he just decided that
he wanted something different. “I went to the
tech school and finished a class. Georgia Power then hired three guys
out of my class,” said Duke.
Duke was hired at Georgia Power in Macon in April 2018. He served
a five-year course to become a certified lineman, which he has been
ever since. “As a lineman, my everyday duties are maintenance,
building new power lines for new customers, rerouting power lines,
doing energized work, hot phases, and any kind of storm work,” said
Duke. “If there’s any kind of major storm work, we would pick eight
line personnel over here, eight line personnel over here, and eight
line personnel from Hawkinsville, Milledgeville, Dublin, and Vidalia.
I’ve been to Texas, New York, and Ohio for storm situations. I’ve been
all over.”
After serving five years as a lineman, Duke started a Troubleman
position just a couple months ago. Discussing some of his possible
duties as a Troubleman, he stated, “If someone calls and their lights
are out or their lights are flickering, I go and determine what the
problem is and I’ll fix it if I’m able to,” explained Duke. “If I need
a crew, then I’ll ask for one and they can come help out. If your
streetlight is out or someone’s having problems troubleshooting, I
work on that. I also pick up wire if needed.”
Asked what’s difficult about his line of work, Duke says the fatigue.
“There are times when we worked 32 hours straight from sun up to
sun down to sun up again. That’s a big challenge when you’re doing
work that could kill you and you’re extremely tired and you have to
worry about the apprentices that haven’t been here in awhile,” said
Duke. “They are extremely tired and they’re not experienced. Also
the amount of caution you have to have and to do your job safely,
you have to know where your work area is.”
If there was an arduous task or situation that Duke was involved
during his time at Georgia Power, it was certainly last year during
Hurricane Irma.
“During Hurricane Irma, we did a lot of work in the Central Georgia
area,” said Duke. “We had over a million customers in the entire state
of Georgia without electricity during that time and that’s the biggest
event to my knowledge that Georgia Power had. We didn’t have a lot
of help but we worked as hard and diligently as we could. We worked
16-hour days just to get the lights on. It was just a good feeling
assisting someone and helping them get their lights back on and
seeing the customer’s reaction and excitement on their face. That’s
what I enjoy the most.”
Laura Branham
REALTOR
Multi-Million Dollar Producer
Home is where your heart is
1271 S Houston Lake Rd. Warner Robins, GA 31088
C: (478) 951-9617 | O: (478) 218-8052
laurabranham@robbinsfree.com
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