EASTLAKE, Ohio — Thousands of residents in the Cleveland area could remain without power until the middle of next week, a FirstEnergy Corp. official said Friday.
Previously, utility customers who were without power Thursday morning received a message that their power was expected to be restored by 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Aug. 14. That is still the case for 95% of FirstEnergy customers, said Torrence Hinton, president of FirstEnergy Ohio.
But for the rest, it could take longer, he said. Given that about 430,000 customers were without power to begin with, that means more than 17,000 customers will have to wait until Thursday or later for their power to be restored.
However, many customers will have power restored before then, Hinton said. In the meantime, authorities are working to provide more precise information on when customers will have power restored.
“If I were them, I would be frustrated too,” Hinton said of the customers. “I would just ask them to continue to be patient.”
Tuesday’s storms spawned at least four tornadoes that touched down near Cleveland, crossed several counties and struck several towns, damaging buildings and downing power lines. Strong wind gusts also hit the area. Wind monitors at Burke Lakefront Airport recorded a gust of up to 86 mph. Wind speeds also reached 74 mph in Fairport Harbor and 67 mph near Edgewater Park.
More than 190,000 homes were without power Friday morning, according to FirstEnergy’s outage map. That’s down from 265,000 homes Thursday morning and 325,000 homes late Wednesday, Cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer reported. In some places, such as Mentor, nearly a quarter of homes are still without power, according to a city news release Friday.
“We haven’t seen this many customers since 1993,” Hinton said.
Compared to other states, Ohio is particularly vulnerable to power outages. Ohio reportedly ranked third in 2022 with the most customers per capita affected by power outages.
Although some local contractors sent electricians to the South to deal with the impact of Hurricane Debby, FirstEnergy did not, Hinton said. Instead, FirstEnergy brought in 5,000 workers from several neighboring states to help restore power.
“We cannot accomplish this task with our internal resources alone,” Hinton said.
