By RALPH BARTHOLDT

Staff Writer

COEUR d’ALENE — Heavy snow early Tuesday left 2,020 downtown Coeur d’Alene customers without power, and may have given a break to defendants who were locked out of the Kootenai County courthouse for about an hour.

The power outage that occurred around 10 a.m. knocked the lights out from Sherman Avenue west to North Idaho College and north to Harrison Avenue, according to Avista spokesperson David Vowels.

A snow-laden limb falling on a distribution line likely caused the 9:41 a.m. outage, Vowels said.

Service downtown was restored at 10:30 a.m., he said, but several other areas, including east Dalton Gardens, parts of Hayden and a rural neighborhood north of Highway 53 near Rathdrum also lost service during the day.

“We are experiencing several outages,” Vowels said. “A lot of them have to do with snow load on the lines.”

With more snow on the way, Avista is bracing for more calls until the weather gets colder later in the week.

Tuesday’s outage that cut the lights, computer and phone service at the Kootenai County Courthouse may have been just the ticket to get a few defendants off the hook.

Trial Court Administrator Karlene Behringer said bailiffs temporarily locked down the courthouse, preventing anyone from entering, for safety reasons.

Anyone who missed their court date will have to reschedule, she said.

“Those cases are just continued,” Behringer said.

Because district courts must have permission to close from the Idaho Supreme Court, Behringer was drafting a request to the state’s high court when the lights came back on, she said.

Tuesday’s onslaught of heavy snow — between 7 and 10 inches with temperatures hovering around 32 degrees — might set a precedent for the rest of the week, and may be an indicator of what’s in store this winter weatherwise.

“We will definitely have a white Christmas,” Press meteorologist Randy Mann said.

Mann predicted several more inches before colder weather sets in later in the week.

“A few degrees makes all the difference in Coeur d’Alene,” he said.

Expect more snow — anywhere from 3 to 4 inches — until cooler weather moves into the area by the end of the week, Mann said.

“Then it’s going to get really cold,” he said.

Temperatures will drop into the 20s and teens by the end of the week and into the single digits by New Year’s, he said.

As temperatures fluctuate this week, street departments will attempt to keep arterials and residential areas relatively snow free.

That’s not always easy when snow turns to slush, said Coeur d’Alene streets director Tim Martin.

“It’s so slushy it tends to swim in front of a plow,” Martin said. “It’s like a tidal wave.”

His crews hope to get rid of the stuff before the next cold snap.

“Our goal is to get all the residential areas plowed out before it gets cold at the end of the week,” he said.

If crews pile a berm at the end of residential driveways causing a problem for the ill or elderly, he asked residents to call the city’s snow line (208-769-2235) or visit the city’s website. A number of resources are available to provide help with snow shoveling, he said.

“It may take a while, but we’ll get there,” he said.