Five More Days Of Power Outages Expected For SC

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Columbia, SC (WOLO)– Thousands are still without power in the Midlands, but crews are working round the clock to get those lights back on. SCE&G expects to have power restored for everyone in the Midlands within the next two to three days. For everyone in the state– including the coastal areas, within three to five days. Electric Co-Ops have less than 300 outages in Lexington county and none reported in Richland county.

“We hope to wrap up activities here in the Midlands so then we can go take care of Beaufort and Charleston as one large team,” Keller Kissam said, SCE&G president of Retail Operations said. 

“They got a lot of work to do,” Rick Nuzum said, a local resident who had the power cut out at 4 on Monday afternoon.  Kissam says their crews worked throughout the night, but there are still thousands without power. The biggest areas hit were Beaufort and Charleston, but Kissam says he knows Lexington and Richland counties suffered a major hit with the high winds. 

“All it takes is that one gust, to affect the tree, which can affect the pole, and affect our infrastructure and lead to outages for our customers,” Kissam said.  Which is what brought down the power from Rick Nuzum’s home. Even without the lights, Nuzum says he feels lucky.  

“Texas, Florida, and even Georgia, and all, they’re worse than we are so… for me, it was less than one day without power so I can’t complain,” Nuzum said.  SCE&G said they are focusing on areas that will bring the power back to the most households, and are sending the crews from other states to the coastal areas. When they are done in the Palmetto state, they’ll be headed down to Florida.

“But all of those crews, some 628 of those resources that were committed to our system before the storm, during the storm, and even after the storm will be on our system and will remain on our system until we release them. And we have no plans to do so until all of our restoration activities are complete,” Kissam said. 

“I was very happy they were able to get out here this morning, considering this happened yesterday and they have a lot more to do,” Nuzum said. Kissam says he does not believe in luck but says we were very blessed that the damage was not worse, and they were able to get so many crews out there so quickly. Kissam said he thanks customers like Nuzum for their patience.