SOUTH BETHANY, Del. - Some neighborhoods in South Bethany were still without power Wednesday as Delmarva Power crews continued restoration work following Winter Storm Hernando.
Delmarva Power said it has restored service to more than 96 percent of customers impacted by the storm and added 400 additional personnel to support restoration efforts, including external and mutual assistance crews from Baltimore Gas & Electric and PECO.
As of 3 p.m. Wednesday, the utility said approximately 1,200 customers remained without power across its service area. That total included about 1,100 customers in Sussex County and fewer than 50 customers in Maryland. Delmarva Power said most of those customers should be restored throughout Wednesday, with all remaining customers expected to be restored by 11 p.m. Thursday.
In South Bethany, the prolonged outage has left homeowners working to stay warm while waiting for restoration times to become reality.
“It’s 47 degrees in the house,” said Angelo DeCesaris, who said he drove down after receiving a restoration estimate but arrived to find the lights still off.
DeCesaris said he received an initial outage notification Sunday night and later got a notice saying power would be back by midafternoon Tuesday.
“We thought we’d be able to get everything straightened out and be able to leave,” he said. “Well, we couldn’t do that because we still don’t have the power.”
DeCesaris told WBOC his power was restored around 4 p.m. on Wednesday.
Tom Rossberg, who said he has lived in the South Bethany area for years, described the past few days as a drawn-out routine.
“When you get to day four, it kind of gets old,” Rossberg said. “We’re just anxious to get it back up and running.”
Delmarva Power said safety is its top priority and crews will continue working until all customers impacted by the storm have been restored.