Still no power? You could be waiting for days, but crews making progress

Everyone without electricity wants to know when power will be restored, and utility companies reported Wednesday that they are making progress.

Georgia Power restored service to nearly 600,000 customers in the 24 hours since repairs began after Tropical Storm Irma dissipated.

The state’s largest electric provider said 95 percent of those affected by Irma should have service restored by Sunday night. More than 1 million customers lost power during one of the strongest and largest tropical systems to hit Georgia in decades.

Statewide, about 262,802 Georgia Power customers were still without electricity as of 6 p.m. Wednesday, including about 20,000 in Macon, according to a map of outages posted on its website.

Extensive damage in some neighborhoods on private property will not be able to be repaired by Georgia Power. Those with snapped poles or lines ripped from their houses will have to contact a qualified electrician to fix those issues.

Crews are trying to restore lines that affect the most customers first, but they can’t yet get to some areas. Downed trees blocking roads are limiting crew mobility across the state as local governments work to clear streets.

A 5 p.m. update from Flint Energies showed 5,405 members still without electricity in 12 counties. The counties with the most outages in their region were Crawford, Houston and Peach.

Tri-County EMC restored serviced to nearly 1,200 members since Tuesday. Three dozen linemen from other states will be coming to assist with repairs of the 17,634 remaining outages that will take days to complete.

Central Georgia EMC restored service to 3,206 customers in 13 counties, according to a Tweet the company posted after 5 p.m.

In the midstate, the company reported a thousand customers in Monroe County, and a few dozen in Jones County, remained without power Wednesday evening.

For more information on specific outages, contact your utility company. Irma affected all of Georgia and Florida, which is complicating recovery efforts due to the widespread nature of the damage.

This story was originally published September 13, 2017 at 9:11 AM with the headline "Still no power? You could be waiting for days, but crews making progress."