“We were very fortunate to have experienced limited damage during the day Sunday,” said E.O. Ferrell, Duke Power’s senior vice president of electric distribution.  “However, a second wave of freezing rain last night resulted in 18,200 additional outages in the Greenville, Spartanburg and Greer, S.C. areas.”

Duke Power’s 2,200 line and tree personnel were available for restoration, augmented by 900 off-system personnel from the Carolinas, Georgia, Texas, Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana.  In addition, more than 350 customer service representatives are standing by to respond to customers’ calls.

Currently, there are 11,400 customer outages. Additional resources are being moved to the Greenville/Spartanburg area to support restoration efforts in this region.

All downed power lines and any object touching a line should be regarded as potentially energized and dangerous.  Outages should be reported by calling 1-800-POWERON (1-800-769-3766).   Spanish speaking customers can call 1-800-943-6914 to report an outage.

Duke Power focuses on restoration efforts in the following sequence, many of which occur simultaneously. This sequence enables power restoration to public health and safety facilities and to the greatest number of locations in the shortest length of time.

·       Public safety related situations (such as de-energizing live lines);

·       Emergency service facilities (hospitals, law enforcement, fire departments);

·       Critical infrastructure (water and sewer facilities);

·       Distribution feeders and subfeeders, the “backbone” of the power delivery system;

·       Distribution tap lines, which connect the backbone to individual locations (neighborhood lines); and

·       Distribution transformers and individual service lines.

THE NEXT UPDATE WILL BE PROVIDED AT 12:30 p.m.

Duke Power, a business unit of Duke Energy, is one of the nation’s largest electric utilities and provides safe, reliable, competitively priced electricity to approximately two million customers in North Carolina and South Carolina. Duke Power operates three nuclear generating stations, eight coal-fired stations, 31 hydroelectric stations and numerous combustion turbine units. Total system generating capability is approximately 17,800 megawatts. More information about Duke Power is available on the Internet at: www.dukepower.com.

Duke Energy is a diversified multinational energy company with an integrated network of energy assets and expertise. The company manages a dynamic portfolio of natural gas and electric supply, delivery and trading businesses – meeting the energy needs of customers throughout North America and in key markets around the world. Duke Energy, headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., is a Fortune 500 company traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol DUK. More information about the company is available on the Internet at: www.duke-energy.com.