Special to Iredell Free News

Statesville Electric crews have been working hard to restore individual power outages and broken poles all over the system.

In a news release, city officials said there is a lot left to do, but crews from Wake Forest, Fayetteville, and Shelby will be joining the full City of Statesville crew and line technicians from High Point to finish the job.

Major work will be done daily from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m. with a small crew available at night, until all the work is complete.

“We think we’ll have most of the customers that were off this morning (Friday) on by 11 p.m., but it will be tough going. We will be back tomorrow to complete the work if we’re not done tonight,”  Statesville Electric Utilities Director John Maclaga said.

It is estimated that about 400 customers are still without power in various places. If you have not reported your outage, call the automated system at 704-878-3479. It is very important that when the automated callback system calls you, that you respond as to whether you power is on or off. This is the primary source of information on where outages may be.

Here are some helpful tips to remember whenever you experience a power outage.

The City cannot forward calls from customers of other utilities. Here are their numbers to call:

♦ EnergyUnited: (1-800-386-4833)
♦ Duke Energy: 800.769.3766
♦ City of Statesville Outage: is 704-878-3479.

There are a number of people with special health needs. Because no power provider can guarantee uninterruptible power or when power will be restored, the city encourages such customers to have a plan for when the power goes out. Because special health needs customers are widely distributed across the City, it’s impossible to work on specific customer outages without greatly slowing down the restoration work. 

“We appreciate the patience that customers have had and understand that ‘it’s starting to get old,’ ” Maclaga added.