Local Power Outages Could Last Into The Weekend
By Mike Dougherty
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Persistent power outages continue to make life difficult for more than 200,000 people around the Delaware Valley and South Jersey.
About 120,000 customers of Atlantic City Electric in Camden and Gloucester counties are still waiting for the juice to get turned back on. Spokeswoman Lendel Jones says the damage is similar to the destruction caused by hurricanes Sandy and Irene.
"This storm was just as severe on our system, and we have our crews out there working around the clock, just as we did with those storms to try to get everybody back in service," she told KYW Newsradio this morning.
Jones expects most people to have power back by midday Saturday.
In Pennsylvania, it's not quite as severe, but it's no picnic either. The damage was mostly in Chester and Delaware counties, where tens of thousands still had no electricity this morning. Officials around Southeastern Pennsylvania expect to have most people reconnected by tomorrow but some outages not fixed until Saturday or even Sunday.
The Philadelphia Union soccer team was opening its stadium, PPL Park, as a temporary shelter beginning at 11am today for people without power.
The good news is, mass transit was just about back to normal this morning, with some exceptions. Septa's Media-Elwyn line was running with minor delays, and NJT's Atlantic City Line was using buses between 30th Street and Atlantic City.