Night of darkness awaits NE Florida seaboard in hurricane’s wake

Downed trees and power lines block the road after Hurricane Hermine blows through Tallahassee, Florida. (Phil Sears)

As Hurricane Matthew churns north along Florida’s northern Atlantic coast, it is leaving hundreds of thousands of people without power as night prepares to fall on Friday.

As of 3 p.m., 92 percent of customers (257,284) in Volusia lacked power, according to the governor’s press office.

Flagler has 96 percent (over 57,000) of its customers without power.

In St. Johns County, 69 percent of customers lack power as the storm churns northward.

Duval County had 90,215 outages; just 22 percent of customers lost power. But at 3 p.m, there were still hours of rough weather ahead in the Jacksonville area.