Every spring, electric line crews pack up their trucks and drive to the Navajo Nation, not to fix an outage but to build power lines from scratch. The program is called Light Up Navajo, and since 2019 it has sent volunteer crews from utilities across the country to connect homes that have never had electricity.

A Mutual Aid Trip With No Emergency

Utility line crews usually travel on mutual aid when a storm knocks out power somewhere else. Light Up Navajo runs on the same mutual aid model, but there is no storm and no outage to fix.

Crews from utilities as far away as Florida and North Dakota volunteer to spend weeks stringing new poles and lines to homes that have been without power for years.

The Navajo Tribal Utility Authority and the American Public Power Association launched the program together in 2019.

The 2026 Season, By the Numbers

Light Up Navajo VII ran for 14 weeks starting in mid-April 2026. By the time it wrapped in August, 51 utilities from 24 states had sent crews, the largest turnout in the program's history.

Together they connected 269 homes to the electric grid for the first time.

This season also included a first of its own: Delta Company, 249th Engineer Battalion Prime Power, a U.S. Army Reserve unit, joined the mutual aid crews. Army photos show the unit stringing roughly 150 power poles across a 10 mile stretch near Winslow, Arizona.

U.S. Army Reserve engineers from the 249th Engineer Battalion Prime Power installing power distribution poles near Winslow, Arizona for Light Up Navajo, May 2026 — An Army Reserve engineer unit joined the volunteer line crews for the first time in 2026.

The Moment the Lights Come On

NTUA shared the story of Judy Crank, whose one room home in Arizona had never had power before this year's crews arrived.

After the line workers finished, Crank plugged in her refrigerator. She heard it hum to life.

"It's on," she said.

She opened the refrigerator doors, saw its bright interior lights, and started to cry.

Why Linemen Keep Coming Back

NTUA General Manager Walter Haase said the trip changes people on both ends of the power line.

"It changes lives, not only for the families who have been waiting, but for the visiting line workers who witness how their skills have made a powerful difference," Haase said.

Seven seasons in, Light Up Navajo has become an annual fixture for the crews who keep signing up to spend their spring stringing wire across the Navajo Nation.

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