On Tuesday evening, destructive thunderstorms, accompanied by significantly high wind gusts up to 87 mph, passed through Delmarva Power’s service territory in Delaware and Maryland, causing extensive tree damage, broken poles, downed wires and damaged electric equipment. The Harford and Cecil counties in Maryland and New Castle County in Delaware saw the most damage in our service area, with several thousand customers losing power. More than 600 personnel, including company crews, local contractors, and resources from several other companies made progress overnight, restoring service to 25,000 of the more than 32,000 customers who lost power.
Crews will continue to work 12-to 16-hour shifts as part of the around-the-clock effort to restore the remaining 7,000 customers impacted. Damage continues to be assessed into daylight hours revealing the extent of damage. This information is vital to estimating times of restoration. After assessing system damage through the night, estimated times of restoration are now available for customers. Based on the current damage outages will extend into the overnight hours.
Delmarva Power is following the standard and proven storm restoration process, which prioritizes addressing life-threatening, safety and health situations, including critical customers such as hospitals, nursing homes, and fire and police facilities. The company will then work to repair equipment that will restore power to the greatest number of customers first, which will include repairing damage to the transmission system across the service area.
Customers can visit delmarva.com, use the company’s mobile app, or contact the company at 800-898-8042 for the latest estimate of when service will be restored to their home or business. It is important for customers to understand that these estimates can, and do, change. Estimated times of restoration are based on current conditions and damage. When crews arrive on site and assess damage for a particular outage, the crew will provide an anticipated restoration time for customers in that area. The company may continue to update the estimated times of restoration as crews perform their work and understand the extent of the needed repairs. Restoration times for specific outages may change frequently.
Source: Delmarva Power