Where’s our electricity? Duke Energy says ‘days, not weeks’
The restoration of electricity is the primary concern of most Pinellas residents impacted by Hurricane Milton. Duke Energy of Florida president Melissa Seixas said Friday morning that 400,000 were without power.
She brought positive news: Crews are on the ground and hard at work. “I’m here to tell you – this is not weeks, this is days. Our forces are here.”
Damage from a Residences at 400 Central construction crane. Photo: Duke Energy Florida.
Siexas spoke during Governor Ron DeSantis’ 11:30 a.m. media event on 1st Avenue South, in the shadow of the Tampa Bay Times/Johnson Pope building, where a wind-tossed construction crane from the neighboring Residences at 400 Central had caused significant structural damage.
Siexas said Duke would announce the estimated restoration times for all impacted customers sometime Friday afternoon.
Pinellas is the most populated county in Duke Energy’s service area, she explained. Efforts on Thursday were focused on restoring power to critical facilities – hospitals, shelters, water treatment plants and 911 centers, approximately 50,000 customers. “Today we started full-bore, a thousand percent, moving very quickly into restorations. So we will begin to see these outage numbers quickly decrease.”
Nearly 350,000 power outages had been restored in Duke’s 35-county service area since Hurricane Milton made landfall Wednesday night. That leaves more than 850,000 without electricity.
“I know people want to get back home, feel like they have some kind of control, clean up their yards,” Seixas said. However, “always, always assume a downed line is energized. It does not always have to arc – it does not always sizzle. It can be a silent killer that is caught up in debris, trees, bushes, flooded water … please stay safe. It is still a dangerous situation out there.”
Damage to the Tropicana Field roof. Photo: Duke Energy Florida
Larry Chaney
October 12, 2024at10:03 am
Why would an entire neighborhood be restored except for a gas station, chiropractic office and 450 residents?
These residents consist mostly of the disabled and the elderly. Also, why would you restore an entire apt complex then turn their power back off. Why was my outage ticket canceled WITHOUT service being restored.
I believe the power is being kept off deliberately to benefit Duke Energy. Federal funding, stock price increase because of more demand and less supply. Also, to support a rate increase. I put nothing pass thus despicable company.
Susan Brooks
October 11, 2024at6:41 pm
How about getting power to the gas stations so we can keep our generator running. Unable to get gas will be out by morning. I need it to run my medical equipment. My husband drive around today for 2 hrs looking alot of places said they have gas but no power.
Pamela Johnson
October 11, 2024at5:47 pm
Yeah ok. Duke knows about a live wire we have down in the middle of the road.. haven’t seen 1 duke truck yet.. smh