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Less than 1% of FPL customers remain without power

Posted at 12:03 AM, Sep 19, 2017
and last updated 2017-09-19 04:43:55-04

On Garfield Road in Delray Beach's Country Club Acres neighborhood, Monday was another night halfway in the dark.

The power is coming back, but parts of the street have been without electricity for nine days after Hurricane Irma passed through. 

RELATED:Later power outage numbers| Less than 1% still without power

 

They are part of the less than 1 percent of Florida Power and Light's customers in our viewing area that are without power. 

Young Michael Cartmen covers his ears because the generator in the back of his house is so loud. 

His parents, Nick Cartmen and Janet Sanchez, who are self-employed, were relieved Monday when power crews arrived in their backyard. 

"After the storm, I realized everyone should be patient. Everyone has their turn and that's fine. But once it is our turn, don't call people away. That's not right. You get all excited about people being here and boop! It's gone. That's not right," Nick said in an interview outside their home. 

According to FPL, crews had to continue work on another part of the line. 

"Those last outages ... are the hardest to restore," said FPL spokesman Bryan Garner, who WPTV interviewed at the utility's Riviera Beach headquarters before going to Delray Beach. 

WPTV asked him when the 160,000 customers without power would have it back? 

"Those outlier cases, each one is a case-by-case basis. Might be cases of extreme damage so at this time it's difficult to say how much time it will take to restore each one," he said. 

A couple of blocks away from the Cartmen's we saw an out of town crew preparing to install a new power pole behind a home. One of their more complex projects. 

"It's slow. It's time consuming. It's manual. But we are going to complete that work until everybody is back online," Garner said. 

FPL says 95 percent of power along Garfield Road is back and it is a priority. Lori Mazaras and Joel Brand will believe it when their power is back. 

"We feel like we're at the bottom of the totem pole here. I don't know how you become a priority but we are certainly not a priority," Lori said in an interview outside their home. 

The number to call if your power is out and you think for some reason FPL doesn't know about it is: 1-800-4-OUTAGES.