February 2, 1999 the power plant in the
Rouge complex blew up. the explosion caused 6 deaths and many more were injured. it was a dark day in Dearborn history. my husband was working but the complex is so big he was almost a mile away at the time. all of the plants did lose power as the power plant supplied all of the power to the Rouge complex as it was designed to do. Henry Ford believed in making their own power for the complex. He liked to have as much control over the manufacturing process as possible. As you can see the shell of the power plant remains to this day - over 17 years later.