Thousands of residents are currently without power across the tri-county area, with Duke Energy saying that they hope to have it restored to 90% of their customers by late Sunday evening.
Orange County officials provided an update on recovery efforts in light of hundreds of thousands of residents losing power in the area.
According to Luz Aviles of the Orlando Utilities Commission, over 97,560 outages were reported as of 11 a.m. on Thursday, September 29 by OUC customers. As of this morning, around 70,000 of those customers have had their power restored.
In total, there are still just under 27,000 OUC customers without power. Aviles says there are nearly six dozen assessment teams currently in the field surveying damage, and more than 300 additional crew members are working to restore remaining outages as soon as possible.
Orange County Mayor Jerry L. Demings says that as of this morning, 35% of Duke Energy Florida customers in Orange County are without power. Crews have restored power to more than 130,000 customers of Duke Energy who live in Orange County. Reading a prepared statement by Duke Energy, Demings says the company expects to restore power to at least 90% of its customers by 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, October 2.
In the city of Winter Park, approximately 1,750 customers are without power.
Major flooding across all three counties continues to hinder utility providers in assessing damage and providing restoration, according to officials.
Officials say they are working on restoring power to the communities with the highest concentration of customers after spending yesterday on critical locations, including hospitals and emergency response centers.
For more information on outages across the area, visit the Orlando Utilities Commission storm center webpage.