Jacob Ogles
Most customers who lost power after Hurricane Helene struck Florida have electricity restored. But almost a full week after the storm delivered impacted the Gulf Coast, almost 10,000 customers still don’t have power.
Tri-County Electric Cooperative (TCEC) customers make up most of those still in blackout conditions. TCEC officials said more than 90% of its customers have service completed, and the vast majority of the remainder should have the lights on by Friday.
“Tri-County Electric Cooperative has established estimated restoration times for meters served by each TCEC substation across our service territory,” a statement from TCEC reads. “Crews are actively working to make repairs to the distribution system off of each substation. Service to meters will be restored as repairs are completed. Many members will receive service well in advance of the estimated restoration time as crews make their way across the system.”
A 6 a.m. update from the Florida Public Service Commission shows 2,600 Taylor County customers without power. That’s about 18.59% of all customers in the county and 32.84% of TCEC customers there. Helene made landfall near Perry as a Category 4 hurricane.
In Madison County, about 2,400 other TCEC customers await service, 31.59% of TCEC customers in the county and 20.79% of all customers there. TCEC also reports 363 customers without power in Jefferson County, 135 in Dixie County and 346 in Lafayette County.
Another 1,400 Dixie County customers on Central Florida Electric Cooperative (CFEC) power also remain in an outage. In total, 14.5% of Dixie County residents are still in the dark. Every other county in Florida impacted by the storm now has power restored for 90% of residents or more.
Levy County also has 1,400 CFEC customers without electricity.
Clay Electric Cooperative reports 894 customers without power in Columbia County. Suwannee Valley Electric Cooperative has 704 without service in Hamilton County.
Gainesville Regional Utilities no longer reports any customers without electricity. The company in a statement Wednesday said power had been restored to more than 66,000 customers impacted by Helene.
