After the storm: Hurricane Milton power outage update

When Hurricane Milton made landfall on the evening of Wednesday, Oct. 9, millions of people lost access to power and water. At one point, 3.2 million had lost power in the state, and 1.7 million of them were on the Gulf Coast. 

In the following days, Tampa Electric, Duke Energy and Florida Power & Light sent crews out in unprecedented numbers to work around the clock. The work has finally paid off, but isn’t quite finished. Almost all power has been restored to customers all over the coast. 

According to released statements, Tampa Electric mobilized 6,000 utility workers from as far away as Texas and Minnesota to assist with power restoration. 97% of its customer base lost power, and after installing 605 transformers, over 1,500 cross arms and about 1,000 poles and over a hundred of miles of wire across its service area so far, 95% of the customer base has restored power.