Duke Energy continues power restoration efforts in the Upstate

SPARTANBURG, S.C. (WSPA) – Duke Energy is still working to restore electricity in the Upstate.

The power company dispersed crews across the region.

In Spartanburg, Hurricane Helene’s storm took down many trees and left yards in disarray.

One local said fallen trees damaged three of his cars and a trailer.

“I got a car here that’s crushed, as well as the trailer, I have a truck in the drive way that was parked here- it had a tree fall across the flatbed,” resident Kevin Trice said.

To make matters worse, Trice said the storm knocked out his power.

“It’s been hard,” Trice said. “I went to Charlotte one day and just got a hotel, just so I just wanted to feel like having a normal day.”

The company said they are working in full force to bring back some normalcy. The power company has thousands of workers coming to help, with some linemen coming from Canada.

Joshua Haithcock is on one of Duke’s repair crews, and after 18 years of work, he said this is one of the worst storm damage he has seen.

“This is a pretty significant event, it’s probably one of the worst storms that I have worked on in my career as far as vegetation damage and the amount of poles we have down,” Haithcock said.

Making repairs can be a dangerous and time-consuming process.

“A big factor of what we have to do is make sure everything is safe before we do it, it’s not as easy and flicking a switch back on there is a lot of time and effort to go into,” Haithcock added.

Haithcock said though the days are long and the work is tough, there is no place he’d rather be.

“This is what I was born to do. I love helping people, it’s rewarding, it’s a very challenging job and I was born into it. I am fourth generation. I enjoy seeing people’s lights come back on,” Haithcock said. “The communities are very excited when we pulled up here today and hopefully by the end of the day we will see some lights coming back on.”

Crews asked residents to be patient with them as they work to restore power.

Duke Energy said they restored nearly 1.6 million customer outages in the Carolinas following Helene and expect to restore power to those with remaining outages by Friday night.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to WSPA 7NEWS.