As power crews continue moving from site to site throughout Sussex, there are still quite a few pockets of residents without electricity following the weekend blizzard.
The following numbers represent some of the larger trouble spots as of roughly 3 p.m. on Feb. 8, according to Delmarva Power & Light Spokesman Matt Likovich:
• Scattered sites throughout Georgetown - Approx. 1,400
• Roxana Road area - 269
• Milton - 152
• Rehoboth (Silverlake Drive area) - 426
As Likovich was updating the numbers over the phone, he stopped mid-sentence to note that the total had just jumped from just over 5,400 to more than 7,000, reinforcing what most county residents already know: Sussex bore the brunt of the storm in Delaware, and is having the most trouble digging out.
Thousands woke up Saturday morning with no electricity, and as of Monday afternoon, more than 6,600 Sussex Countians were still without power. Shelters had been set up at Sussex Central, Milford and Cape high schools to accommodate residents in need, while Delaware National Guard crews were out in force working to make a path to residents’ homes.
The total number of residents in high-school shelters on Monday was down to just over 100, but some residents truly feel left out in the cold.
On 9 a.m. Monday morning, Michele Hogsett, of Millsboro, unable to make it to one of the shelters, was melting icicles for water and running out of food she could cook on a wood stove.
“We were one of the first to lose power and to report it, at 2:40 a.m. on Saturday, [Feb. 6] and, it seems, the last to get it back,” Hogsett said.
Homes in some parts of Georgetown lost power at least twice over the weekend, once for a five-to-eight-hour stretch on Saturday, and then again for approximately two hours on Sunday, in addition more than 1,400 residents who were still in the dark on Monday afternoon.
But Hogsett, who lives on Wiley Branch Road, said she was told by the Delaware Electric Cooperative (DEC) that, because only 86 customers in her neighborhood were without power, “we were not a priority.”
By 1:30 p.m. on Monday afternoon, Hogsett had seen the first DelDOT plows in her neighborhood. “Now the electric company won’t have an excuse,” she said. Just before 4 p.m. on Feb. 8, a DEC crew was on-site assessing the situation.
DEC Spokesman Rob Book said that in a situation with mass outages, work crews “have to work from big to little. We have to restore the major circuits before we can help people down the line.” Book added that, on Monday, DEC crews were still working from big to small, “but if we drive past a single outage, we’ll go in and fix it."
Likovich agreed.
"I've heard it likened to the way the snow plows work. They're going to do U.S. 113 and U.S. 13 first, and then work their way outward," he said.
At the height of DP&L's outages, Likovich said approximately 47,000 customers in Delaware and Maryland were without power. He added that the majority of DP&L users would have their power restored by Monday night, but that some customers may not see their lights back on until Tuesday evening.
For the latest outage information, visit DP&L or the Delaware Electric Cooperative websites.
