CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Early this evening, Duke Energy reported about 135,000 outages as the company worked to restore power after a lingering two-day winter storm.
"With Thursday's second blast of winter weather, we are now experiencing outages in new areas and those hardest hit," said Jeff Corbett, senior vice president of Duke Energy's Carolinas Delivery Operations. "We are working as quickly and safely as possible."
While many of Wednesday's outages were in the Duke Energy Progress area, today's new outages were in the Duke Energy Carolinas area. With additional resources brought in from the company's Midwest and Florida operations, Duke Energy will have about 3,900 personnel restoring outages.
"We'd like to thank our customers, who are being as patient as possible as we restore power," said Corbett. "We are doing everything we can to shorten the length of every outage by moving resources to make the biggest impact."
You can access specific outage numbers for your region at www.duke-energy.com/storms. You can select your local utility from the following options on the site:
Duke Energy Progress – Which serves eastern N.C., eastern S.C. and Asheville, N.C.
Duke Energy Carolinas – Which serves the Piedmont area of N.C. and Upstate S.C.
These estimated times of restoration indicate when the majority of outages in specific locations are anticipated to be restored. Many customers will have service sooner than the estimated times. There also may be scattered outages remaining beyond these times depending on individual cases.
North Carolina
- Anson County – Saturday, noon
- Cabarrus County – Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Catawba County – Friday, 3 p.m.
- Columbus County – Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Gaston County – Friday, 3 p.m.
- Lincoln County – Friday, 3 p.m.
- Mecklenburg County – Saturday, noon
- New Hanover County, Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Rowan County – Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Robeson County – Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Stanly County – Saturday, 11:45 p.m.
- Union County – Friday, 3 p.m.
South Carolina
- Clarendon County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
- Dillon County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
- Florence County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
- Lancaster County – Friday, 9 p.m.
- Marion County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
- Sumter County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
- Union County – Friday, 3 p.m.
- Williamsburg County – Sunday, 11:45 p.m.
Overall, customer outages have totaled more than 660,000. In some cases, a customer may have experienced more than one outage. To repair infrastructure, the company will often have to bring customers off line to safely replace equipment before restoring power to a greater numbers of customers.
Continued adverse weather will create additional outages. Customers should still contact the company to report outages.
Customers who experience an outage should call Duke Energy's automated outage-reporting systems for their respective utility:
- Duke Energy Carolinas: 1-800-POWERON
(1-800-769-3766) - Duke Energy Progress: 1-800-419-6356
- Spanish-speaking customers can call: 1-866-4APAGON
Safety
Stay away from power lines that have fallen or are sagging. Consider all lines energized as well as trees or limbs in contact with lines. If a power line falls across a car that you're in, stay in the car. If you MUST get out of the car due to a fire or other immediate life-threatening situation, do your best to jump clear of the car and land on both feet. Be sure that no part of your body is touching the car when your feet touch the ground.
Restoring power
Restoring power after an ice storm can be challenging as travel conditions are poor. Before power can be restored, crews first assess damage and determine what crews, equipment and supplies will be needed to make repairs. Because of this, customers may see damage assessors patrolling their neighborhoods before crews arrive to begin work.
Crews prioritize work to ensure the largest number of customers is restored as quickly and safely as possible. Essential services such as hospitals and emergency responders have priority.
Here is a graphical explanation: http://www.duke-energy.com/pdfs/How-Duke-Energy-Restores-Power.pdf
If you lose power, please turn off as many appliances and electronics as possible. This will help with restoration efforts as it will reduce the immediate demand on the power lines when power is restored.
Once your power is restored, wait a few minutes before turning your equipment back on.
Updates will be provided on Twitter at www.twitter.com/DukeEnergyStorm and www.facebook.com/DukeEnergyStorm.
Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Duke Energy is a Fortune 250 company traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol DUK. More information about the company is available at: www.duke-energy.com.