TERESA DIXON MURRAY
PLAIN DEALER REPORTER

Despite the chaos of yesterday's power outage across a large section of the nation, the economic effect should be minimal if electricity is restored by today.

Major power outages, such as those caused by flooding in Chicago a decade ago, merely postpone economic activity and cause inconvenience, said Diane Swonk, chief economist for Bank One Corp. there.

"As long as it is not terrorist-related, it will (only) force people to postpone business or go to a part of the city where there is power," Swonk said.

Economist Randy Carver of Mentor compared the outage to a major snowstorm that shuts down a region of the country.

"Unless we get into next week, it's like a long holiday weekend and it's not a big deal."

The disruption, however, seemed pretty big in much of Northeast Ohio when the power went out just before the end of the business day.

At Republic Steel in Lorain, the plant nearly had a meltdown, Lorain Assistant Fire Chief Randy Hupp said. Within 15 to 30 minutes after the power went out, the plant lost the ability to cool the iron inside a blast furnace and the molten metal melted through the side of the furnace and started spilling inside the building. Several fires erupted, sending an orange-gray plume of smoke that was visible throughout the city.

Company officials, fearing an explosion, wouldn't even let firefighters inside, Hupp said. The workers contained the fires but Republic told the fire department it may take weeks to get the furnace repaired.

The news was much better at International Steel Group Inc. in Cleveland, which had enough backup systems to allow for an orderly shutdown of its steel plant on the East Side of the Cuyahoga River, plant General Manager Bill Brake said.

Although ISG is a major customer of FirstEnergy, it has two powerhouses that supplement its electricity demands. The system provided enough power to bring operations to a controlled stop and can handle the demand for several days, the company said.

ISG was able to shut down critical machinery before the outage. Employees saw an unusual dip in the power grid and issued a warning.

Elsewhere, about 1,000 employees were evacuated from Ford Moto Company's four plants in Greater Cleveland. Backup generators kicked in to activate emergency lights that guided workers to the doors in Brook Park, Avon Lake, Lorain and Walton Hills.

At Cleveland-based Lincoln Electric, although the company has auxiliary power, the second shift was sent home about 4:30 p.m. Spokesman Rob Morrow said Lincoln would decide whether to open the plant today based on whether workers could get to work safely.

At one of Cleveland's largest employers, National City Bank, about 2000 downtown employees and hundreds of other bank workers were given the option of leaving, spokeswoman Amber Garwood said. National City's operations centers were operating on generators; the bank tentatively planned to open today.

Third Federal Savings was typical of many Northeast Ohio businesses. It had no idea yesterday evening if it would be open today. Its headquarters and about half of its local branches were without power last evening, although its customer department service was open.

"We won't open until we have power," spokeswoman Monica Martines said. "People may have to drive to an open branch if they need money."

It was business as usual at some locations, including the Federal Reserve Bank in Cleveland, which was operating on back-up power. The back-up power will last indefinitely as long as there's access to fuel, the Fed said.

Also not affected was Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. in Akron, which has its own power plant. The tire maker's headquarters, technology center and Goodyear Hall all were operating normally yesterday afternoon.

Some people just wanted it to be business as usual. The Lake Avenue Marathon in Lakewood was getting about 75 calls an hour from people wondering if they could buy gas.

"I don't think you're going to find anyone in the radius of this power outage able to pump gas," attendant Tom Harris said. "You gotta figure, every single day there are people saying , 'I'll fill up tomorrow.'"

"Yesterday evening, it was too late."

Plain Dealer reporters Rachel Dissell, Alison Grant, Becky Gaylord, Peter Krouse and Mary Vanac contributed to this story.