Rebuilding Lives: Duke Energy's Ongoing Efforts to Restore Power After Severe Storms

Thousands remain without power after severe storms, including tornado-warned storms, rolled through Greater Cincinnati Tuesday afternoon.

As of 7:20 a.m., more than 121,000 Duke Energy customers remain without power across over 4,000 active outages.

John Juech, director of communications for Duke, joined WLWT's 6 a.m. newscast to discuss the ongoing efforts to restore power.

"This was a very significant event. We have a lot of crews out in the field right now restoring power throughout the Tri-State," Juech said. "We've restored about 60,000 homes; they've restored power to thousands of customers. But, fallen trees, broken poles, and damaged equipment are slowing restoration efforts.

"We continue to assess the damage and restore power as conditions allow, but obviously, we're expecting more storms today."

More heavy rain is expected across Greater Cincinnati Wednesday, with rounds of slow-moving, intense downpours bringing with it the threat of flash flooding.

Juech says they restore power using a process designed to return service to the greatest number of customers as quickly, and safely, as possible. He says facilities that support public health and safety, such as hospitals or government buildings, are prioritized before they move into residential neighborhoods.

"We are fully staffed, we are deploying additional resources," he continued. "We have line workers, damage assessors, and tree trimmers throughout the Tri-State."

The difficult aspect of Tuesday's storms, Juech says, is it was a "high-vegetation event," meaning a lot of trees came down on powerlines and transmission lines. This requires crews to clear the tree and then rebuild a line. Juech described it as "a complicated process."

If you experience an outage, you can report it by texting "OUT" to 57801.

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