Florida’s largest power company says people need to be careful picking up debris from Hurricane Milton, since live power lines could be hidden underneath the rubble.
“We are encouraging them to stay away from debris where there would potentially be any type of overhead wire,” Melissa Seixas, Florida president of Duke Energy, told CNN’s Kate Bolduan on Friday morning. “They don’t necessarily spark. They don’t necessarily hiss. But they are a silent, deadly killer for somebody who is not trained to handle them.”
Nearly 900,000 of Duke Energy’s 2 million Florida customers were still without power as of 8:30 a.m. Friday. Seixas said the damage assessment is continuing, but they plan to put out a timetable by Friday afternoon for when areas can expect to see electric service restored.
The most significant outage for Duke Energy on Friday morning continued to be Pinellas County, which includes St. Petersburg, where more than 80 percent of their customers are without power.
