Morgan City crews ready to restore power after dark, when Barry permits

Workers in Morgan City were ready at 6 p.m. to begin the job of restoring electricity, Mayor Frank "Boo" Grizzaffi said Saturday night.

The darkness won't stop them, but the weather is. In the meantime, all Morgan City electric customers are without power.

"We've evaluated the issues," Grizzaffi said. "But we can't get out there with bucket trucks when these little bands are coming through with 30 mph winds."

Morgan City has contractors from other utilities standing by to help restore power.

Power outages began Friday night and continued until the majority of the system was down when Lakeside Subdivision lost power Saturday. That's when the city decided to shut down the whole system to protect it.

"Toward the end we had a fragile system, and we were turning it on and it would flicker off," Grizzaffi said.

Elsewhere, one Morgan City mobile home near Lakeside Park was turned over by the wind.

The city has also experienced problems with the sewage system. Grizzaffi said getting electricity will solve some of those problems.

"Right now, our No. 1 priority is to restore power," Grizzaffi said.

Cleco reported 17,000 St. Mary customers without power at 1 p.m. Another 500 are without power in St. Martin.

“Cleco crews are assessing damage and restoring power to impacted areas,” said James Lass, general manager of distribution operations and emergency management, in a news release. “Our crews will continue to work as long as weather conditions are safe.”

When restoring power, once conditions are safe, Cleco crews patrol the lines and assess the damage by both ground and air, the company said. First, power is restored to critical community services such as hospitals, nursing homes and police and fire departments. Next, power is restored to the greatest number of customers in the shortest amount of time. Cleco then continues to safely work to restore power to all customers who can take power.