(Reuters) – Nearly 109,000 homes and businesses still lacked power in Florida on Friday, eight days after Hurricane Ian crashed across the state on Sept. 28-29.
U.S. President Joe Biden met with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis this week to assess the devastation from Hurricane Ian, and stressed the need for a united federal and state effort for the lengthy recovery ahead.
Utilities have restored service to most customers after Ian knocked out power to more than 4 million in Florida and over 1.1 million in North Carolina and South Carolina.
Florida Power & Light Co (FPL) said it expects restoration to be essentially complete by Friday night.
But FPL noted that thousands of homes and businesses in southwest Florida, where the storm hit with 150 mile per hour (241 kph) winds on Sept. 28, were so badly damaged that they may not be able to safely receive electrical service.
FPL is a unit of Florida energy company NextEra Energy Inc.
Major outages by utility:
Power Company State/Pro Out Now Customers Served
vince
Lee County Electric Co-op FL 238,000
74,196
NextEra – FPL FL 5,280,000
35,058
Total Out
109,254
Source: PowerOutage.us and power companies
(Reporting by Seher Dareen in Bengaluru, and Scott DiSavino; Editing by Bill Berkrot)
