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Restoration Update
04/16/2020
The hard work by our restoration workforce has returned to service 76 percent of the customer outages caused by the Easter Sunday storms. At 7 a.m., we had 46,680 customers out of service in Arkansas and Mississippi.
Customers in Louisiana who can safely take power have had their service restored. More information about current outages and restoration times is available on our View Outages map. Current outages include:
- Arkansas, 41,022.
- Mississippi, 5,658.
We expect to return service to many Arkansas customers today. It will be late Friday, April 17, before all customers are restored. Additional resources have been mobilized to assist with the restoration in Arkansas. Repairs are underway, even as damage continues to be assessed. Estimated restoration times and area-specific details will be communicated when available.
In Mississippi, we have restored 76 percent of customer outages. All customers who can safely take power should be restored by late tonight.
We have more than 4,800 workers restoring service for our customers from within our company and from contractors and our mutual assistance agreements with utilities. Do not approach utility workers at a job site. Our work sites can be dangerous locations and interruptions will slow our workers’ progress. This is especially true regarding social distancing and other aspects of the response to COVID-19.
In some cases, customers may need to make repairs to customer-owned equipment – the meter base – where electricity enters the structure. If damaged, then repaired, customers must obtain inspections before we are able to safely restore power to these locations.
It is frustrating to be without power for this long, but the storm caused extensive damage to our system that we must repair. At 7 a.m. today, total damages to our distribution system included 2,001 utility poles, 404 transformers and 3,363 spans of wire damaged or destroyed. In our transmission system, total damages included 112 Entergy-owned substations and nearly 1,000 miles of transmission lines out of service.
If you don’t see us working near you, keep in mind that we may be working on another part of the electrical system that you can’t see but is needed to get power to you.
It can be frustrating for you if you see trucks move away from an area before power is restored. Our work, however, must take place in a certain order, determined by a restoration plan that considers how electricity flows to your neighborhood and prioritizes critical customers. Trucks and workers will return to your area as soon as possible to complete the restoration work.
Due to the additional efforts we must take due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the significant and widespread outages, restoration times may be extended.
View photos of storm damage here.
