(Reuters) – More than 100,000 homes and businesses in Florida were without power on Thursday as hurricane Helene looked poised to make landfall in the state’s Big Bend region, according to data from PowerOutage.us.
Hurricane Helene churned toward Florida’s Panhandle region, bringing the threat of a potentially deadly storm surge to much of the coastline.
Helene was forecast to continue gaining power on its northward path toward the Big Bend region. It was expected to make landfall this evening, possibly as a Category 4 storm with sustained winds in excess of 130 mph (209 kph).
The utility company with the largest number of customers affected was Florida Power & Light Company, which had 88,722 clients without power.
It was followed by Tampa Electric, with 7,080 customers cut off in the state.
Here are the major outages by utility in Florida:
Power Companies Outages
Florida Power & Light Company 88,722
Tampa Electric 7,080
Lee County Electric Coop 4,979
Duke Energy 4,641
Withlacoochee River Electric Coop 1,499
Total 106,921
(Reporting by Anjana Anil in Bengaluru; Editing by David Gregorio)
