Only four Maine electricity customers remained without power Monday night, two days after a powerful windstorm swept through the state.
As of 9:40 p.m., Central Maine Power Co. was reporting no outages, and Emera Maine, which serves northern and eastern Maine, had just four – on Deer Isle.
Saturday’s windstorm, which knocked down trees and power lines, took out electricity to about 38,000 households and businesses served by CMP in southern and central Maine.
At its peak, nearly 80,000 customers statewide had lost power, including about 40,000 customers of Emera Maine.
CMP and Emera Maine had both restored power to most of their customers by Monday evening. As of 5 p.m., CMP had just 55 customers, most of them in Farmington or Wilton, without electricity, while Emera Maine reported that 761 customers, most of whom live in Hancock County, were still in the dark.
Emera Maine spokeswoman Judy Long said in a statement late Monday afternoon that restoration efforts would continue throughout the night and wouldn’t end until everyone’s power has been restored.
CMP had also expressed confidence that power would be restored to everyone by the end of the day Monday.
The storm brought heavy rains and wind gusts of up to 50 mph before it wound down late Saturday night.
“It was short-lived but intense,” CMP spokeswoman Catharine Hartnett said.
But not as intense as last year’s dramatic Oct. 30 storm, which left many Mainers without power for up to a week and included recorded gusts of 80 mph.
“Our peak outage was 38,000,” Hartnett said of Saturday’s windstorm. “Last year it was 480,000.”
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