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Extensive damage on system is making restoration work lengthy
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Estimated restoration times continually updated at Duke-Energy.com/storm
CINCINNATI – Duke Energy crews have now restored more than 95 percent of customer outages in Ohio and Kentucky following a strong storm system that roared through the area Wednesday morning.
The remaining 5,000 outages are located in the hardest hit areas of Clermont, Hamilton and Brown counties in Ohio and in Boone County in Kentucky.
“Our crews have made progress making repairs under difficult circumstances,” said Howard Fowler, Duke Energy storm director. “This morning, with additional wind gusts, our outage numbers picked up again, so we certainly want to thank our customers for their patience and support during this restoration work.”
Customer outages peaked at 45,861 on Wednesday. Since the beginning of the storm, a total of 95,715 customers had been restored as of 9 p.m. today.
“Unfortunately, the extent of damage on our system involving lengthy repairs such as broken poles and infrastructure has been challenging. The extensive damage we’ve experienced has also caused us to revise some of our estimated times of restoration,” Fowler said, “but our crews will continue to work until all customers are restored.”
An additional 40 linemen from Duke Energy Indiana arrived in the area today to help with the restoration work, complementing the more than 600 who’ve been working the storm since it began.
Since the storm began, over 90 utility poles have been damaged requiring replacement. More than 300 spans of wire have needed to be rehung and reenergized. At least 25 percent of those lines were on 65-foot tall transmission poles that require specialized equipment to reach that height for the repair work.
“The transmission side of the system was heavily damaged in the storm, which slowed down efforts to restore power as quickly as we’d hoped,” Fowler said. “This is the type of work that takes considerable manpower and time to complete.”
Revised restoration estimates are as follows:
Kentucky:
- Boone, Kenton, Campbell counties -- 3 p.m. Friday
Ohio:
- Clermont, Brown, Hamilton counties -- 9 p.m. Friday
Outage reporting and status updates
Customers who are without power should report their outage by:
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Visiting our mobile website at m.duke-energy.com
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Texting OUT to 57801 (Standard text and data charges may apply)
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Calling the automated outage-reporting system at 800.543.5599
About Duke Energy Ohio & Kentucky
Duke Energy Ohio/Kentucky’s operations provide electric service to about 850,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers in a 3,000-square-mile service area and natural gas service to approximately 529,000 customers.
Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Duke Energy is one of the largest energy holding companies in the United States. Its Electric Utilities and Infrastructure business unit serves approximately 7.5 million customers located in six states in the Southeast and Midwest. The company’s Gas Utilities and Infrastructure business unit distributes natural gas to approximately 1.6 million customers in the Carolinas, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. Its Commercial Renewables business unit operates a growing renewable energy portfolio across the United States.
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Media contact:
Sally Thelen
Office: 513.287.2432
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