Hurricane Zeta: State recovering from power outages, supply shortage (2024)

With approximately 69% of Dallas County homes and businesses without electricity, Toya Stiles is on the hunt for water, food and ice so residents won’t go hungry over the weekend.

“I know people have kids, and they’re hungry,” said Stiles, the county’s emergency management director. “The weather has changed. It’s cold now and people are without any heat."

The county in the heart of Alabama’s Black Belt was hit hard by Hurricane Zeta, one of more than two dozen Alabama counties where residents continue to sit in the dark after Zeta’s wrath blew through the state. The widespread power outage, which extends from Mobile County in South Alabama to Calhoun and Cleburne counties in Northeast Alabama, is being compared to outages in some of the most devastating storms that have slammed into the state.

According to Beth Thomas, spokeswoman with Alabama Power, the power outage impact associated with Wednesday’s hurricane is on par “to what the company experienced during Hurricane Katrina and the April 11 tornadoes in 2011.”

The company reported, as of noon on Friday, 215,000 customers remained without power statewide. While that number was cut considerably in the past 24 hours, emergency management officials believe it will take days – if not well into next week – before power is restored to some of the more rural counties where trees and power poles have toppled over.

A curfew in the city of Mobile is being lifted tonight despite lingering power outages in some areas. The city will use generators to power traffic lights at major intersections that are still without power after sunset, and will dispatch police officers to direct traffic. The city had instituted a citywide curfew on Thursday after it became apparent that dozens of intersections, including major thoroughfares, would not have power restored by nightfall.

“While we weren’t as impacted as some of our neighbors, the storm brought high winds that knocked down trees and power lines across the city – leaving thousands without power and more than 106 traffic signals without power,” Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson said in a statement. “Power restoration efforts are ongoing around the city, but this plan will help keep motorists safe and eliminate the need for a curfew in the meantime.”

Around 39,000 customers were without power in Mobile County Friday afternoon, with a majority of those outages reportedly in the coastal area and in the northern parts of the county where cities like Citronelle were hard hit. Citronelle, as of Friday afternoon, had 6,400 people without electricity.

Related: ‘We’ll recover’: Citronelle begins to dig out after Hurricane Zeta

In Dallas County, 15,000 of the approximately 19,000 Alabama customers remained in the dark by mid-day on Friday. In Wilcox County, just to the south of Dallas County, 91% of customers with Alabama Power and Pioneer Electric Coop remain without electricity. Power outages remained high in Perry, Clarke, Washington, Chilton and Coosa counties.

“Crews are working as quickly and as safely as they can to restore service,” Thomas said. “It will take several days to restore service to everyone.”

Election scramble

Next week’s election also adds a unique twist into the situation, where counties are scrambling to find ways to power up polling sites that have been left in the dark. Thomas said that polling sites are “located in public facilities” and she deemed those locations as “a high priority for us.”

The storm pushed back in-person absentee voting in four counties to Friday: Clarke, Wilcox, Dallas and Washington. Those counties had to close their absentee election offices on Thursday, because of the storm, and had to reopen on Friday to allow for in-person absentee voting for one more day, according to Secretary of State John Merrill.

Washington County Probate Judge Nick Williams said that 99% of his county’s polling sites are without power, and he’s hopeful that power is restored before Tuesday’s election.

In Dallas County, Probate Judge Jimmy Nunn said 27 of the county’s 29 precincts are in the dark. He said that plans are moving forward to get generators running at the polling sites on Tuesday if electricity is not restored by then.

“We are working with the Secretary of State and Alabama Power and other electrical companies to get power in here by Tuesday,” said Dunn. “The goal is to get a generator and/or have the electrical on. We giving (Alabama Power) the addresses to get the power on at these locations. If the power is not on, the next alternative (is a generator).”

Dunn said it’s imperative for power to be restored at the polling sites on Election Day. He said the county’s voting machines require electricity. He also said the polling sites would be too dark to vote in during the evening hours on Tuesday. Voting is allowed to occur until 7 p.m.

“The main thing they are trying to do right now is get the lights on and the people out of the dark,” Dunn said.

Inexperience with hurricanes

Concerns over Hurricane Zeta also focus on the lack of experience some of the affected counties have with hurricanes. Typically, hurricane recovery operations are confined to coastal Alabama counties such as Baldwin and Mobile counties which are still digging out from the massive damage brought about by Hurricane Sally on September 16.

In Mobile County, cities near the Gulf Coast like Dauphin Island are recovery from damage from Zeta. But heavy tree damage and massive power outages extend north toward Mt. Vernon and Citronelle.

Mike Evans, deputy director with Mobile County EMA, said that Citronelle likely hasn’t dealt with major damage from a hurricane since at least Hurricane Frederic in 1979. Citronelle was hammered by Zeta as homes and businesses were damaged by fallen trees and power lines. On Wednesday, while the storm swept through Citronelle, the city’s police department pushed to have the city’s entire power grid shut down so that emergency crews could respond to rescue calls.

Evans said that typically after a hurricane, the county’s EMA rarely – if ever – has to talk to city officials in Citronelle over what kind of assistance they need in terms of tarps, water and food.

“Most storms, when they get up (to the northern parts of the county), they normally don’t see much,” Evans said.

Hurricane Zeta made landfall in southeastern Louisiana before racing through Mississippi and entering Alabama in Conecuh County. The storm, packing Category 1 strength winds of at least 75 mph, slammed into Citronelle before moving into Washington and Clarke counties.

“They were getting what they have not experienced in a long time, or maybe ever,” said Evans.

In Clarke County, power has been restored to most of Thomasville, but outages remains throughout the county. Halloween trick-or-treating has been canceled in Jackson, and other cancellations are expected as well.

“The biggest concern is that there are a lot of trees down,” said Ron Baggette, chief investigator with the Clarke County Sheriff’s Department. “Most folks cut some sort of pass to get through (blocked roadways), but there are some hanging limbs out there in parts of the road. There are a lot of power poles leaning over.”

Clarke County was the site of the only fatality from Hurricane Zeta. According to Baggette, 44-year-old Billy Lee Watkins was found dead inside his mobile home in rural Morvin around 8 a.m. Thursday after a tree had fallen on top it during the brunt of Wednesday night’s storm.

Related: Hurricane Zeta blamed for at least 6 deaths across the South

Supply scramble

A scramble for supplies, such as tarps, is underway in many counties. In Clarke County, EMA director Roy Waite said that 400 tarps have been handed out and that a request is out to the Alabama Emergency Management Agency for 600 more. He said that the non-profit Operation Blessing has donated large, roll tarps.

He said the American Red Cross was in Jackson providing assistance, and that county officials were working to get a temporary charging station set up to assist people who need their medical devices, like oxygen tanks, charged.

Waite said efforts are underway to plan ahead for the election in case the county’s power isn’t completely restored.

“We are working diligently to make sure our election sites have power,” he said. “We have no damage to the (polling site) buildings. We are going to have to find a generator for them.”

In Dallas County, the lack of supplies sounded more dire on Friday. Stiles, the EMA director, said she was awaiting on confirmation from the state EMA about getting bottled water into the county. She said the county needs to get ice and food to residents.

She said a food truck was lined up for Monday, but that she was worried about residents having access to a meal this weekend.

“We are trying to find someone today,” she said.

According to Alabama EMA, the state has issued 10 pallets of tarps to Clarke County and 20 boxes of tarps to Dallas County. Additional supplies of tarps have been sent to Mobile, Perry, Washington and Escambia counties.

The state has also sent 10 pallets of water to Clarke County and five pallets to Washington County. The state has also sent two pallets of ready-to-eat meals to Clarke and Washington counties.

In Washington County, Sheriff Richard Stringer said the recovery progress had been moving “very, very slowly,” and acknowledged that his sheriff’s deputies were spending time clearing out roads fill with debris. Stringer said that local churches were volunteering to provide meals to people who remain without power, and that residents throughout the county had “come together” to clear rural roads where trees had fallen.

Stringer criticized county leaders for a lack of coordination because Washington County does not have a full-time emergency management director. He said that Washington County has been without someone leading its emergency management response since last year.

“We’ve had coronavirus and major issues like this,” said Stringer, who blames the county commission for not filling the job with a full-time hire. “It’s a times like this, a critical time, when you need an EMA director.”

Washington County Commission Chairman Allen Bailey said the county’s engineer is the interim EMA director. He said the county has “gotten everything we’ve asked for.”

Bailey said supplies are being shipped to 19 volunteer fire department stations scattered throughout the county. He said more water and food is expected in the coming days.

He said that getting schools open by early next week will depend on when electricity is restored.

“We’re probably not going to have power to all of them by Monday,” said Bailey. “We’re trying to get generators hooked up to the cafeteria. We don’t want the food to spoil.”