More than 604,000 DTE Energy customers are without power Thursday morning, a day with highs expected to reach 90 degrees, after the second and third waves of thunderstorms crossed the region in overnight and morning hours.
This number increased from 7 a.m., further challenging the hundreds of crews working at restoration, as third round of storms passed over the southern portion of the region in the 7-8 a.m. hours.
“Wind gusts over 70 mph and heavy rain caused extensive damage across the service territory, including more than 3,100 downed wires, broken poles and tree-related damage,” DTE Energy reported Thursday early. “More than 1,800 DTE personnel are working to restore service, and we have called in more than 1,000 additional out-of-state linemen to help with restoration efforts.”
Unlike the July storms that struck more narrow regions and knocked out power to thousands, restoration is a statewide effort. Tuesday night storms knocked out power to nearly 300,000 Consumers Energy customers with outages extending from southwest Michigan to the northern part of the Lower Peninsula.
With nearly 235,000 Consumers Energy customers without power at 1 p.m. Thursday, Michigan has more than 839,000 without power.
The outages in metro Detroit are scattered throughout the region, and most of the clusters of DTE Energy outages do not yet have estimated restorations. Consumers Energy is offering estimated restoration times extending into Sunday.
In Rochester, police advised residents needing to power up a device or else cool off from the heat to visit either the Rochester Hills Public Library in the downtown or else the Older Persons’ Commission on Letica, both of which have had power.
“They have been nice enough to open their doors for this service,” Rochester police posted on Facebook. “Please bring your own charger; they have the power.”
South Lyon police announced early Thursday afternoon that the outages had impacted the railroad signals in the area.
“CSX is on scene and DTE has been notified,” South Lyon police said in a message. “We, like everyone else, do not have an estimated restoration time. Please be patient and avoid the area.”
In Bloomfield Hills, emergency responders were arriving shortly after 1 p.m. Thursday to a fire in a small neighborhood off of Woodward Avenue, north of Big Beaver Road. Part of the neighborhood had lost power.
The stormy weather concluded early this morning, but then those without power must contend with a hot and humid day. And with many possibly have to wait days for restoration, the good news is that temperatures return to normal on Friday and through the weekend, according to accuweather.com. The highs on Thursday will be in the lower 80s, and then from Saturday through Monday, they will be in the upper 70s.
The National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning and urban / stream flood advisories for southern Oakland and Macomb counties as well as northern Wayne County. Those were set to expire at 9 a.m. and 8:15 a.m. Thursday – after the morning storms leave the area. The heavy rains impacted travel on roadways, including on northbound I-75, according to WDIV.
On Wednesday, severe thunderstorms have caused massive outages throughout southeast Michigan, affecting Oakland, Macomb, and Wayne counties, as temperatures hardly dropped in the overnight hours.
As the storm moved from Rochester Hills into Macomb County, the wind was observed blowing small branches from trees.
This follows overnight storms Tuesday into Wednesday that knocked out power to nearly 200,000 Consumers Energy customers in western and northern Michigan.
According to the DTE Energy Outage Map, about 406,500 customers were without power as of 6 p.m., Wednesday, Aug. 11, and the outage map was briefly unavailable. By 7 p.m. it was up to 408,000.
DTE Energy warned area residents to stay at least 20 feet away from all downed power lines and anything they are in contact with, considering all lines live.
The company reported that more than 2,000 lines were downed in the afternoon storms and than more than 420 crews were in the field at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday.
“Our teams are working 16 hour shifts around the clock to restore power and secure down power lines as quickly and safely as possible,” DTE reported in a statement. “We have called in 1,000 additional out-of-state linemen to help with restoration efforts. Customers will receive a more detailed estimate once a crew has been assigned to their outage.”
Reports indicated that trees or large branches had fallen over both Orion Road between Kern and Clarkson roads in Orion Township and Adams Road at Hillendale Drive (south of Walton Boulevard) in Rochester Hills. Utility poles were knocked over in Brandon Township.
Initially, the storm quickly knocked out power to 225,000 from southern Michigan up into Oakland County, but within an hour, another 100,000 were in the dark with the storms moving through Macomb County.
Consumers Energy reported at 6 p.m. that electrical crews were en route from Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky to work in western and northern Michigan.
In all at about 6 p.m., more than 626,000 homes and businesses in Michigan were without power, with another round of storms expected to cross the state from the northwest to the southeast in the nighttime and overnight hours.
For those without power, according to accuweather.com, it will be a muggy and warm Wednesday night as temperatures will stay at about 80 degrees through the early morning hours and only dip to 77 degrees at 5 or 6 a.m., then rising back into the 80s by 9 a.m. and then up to 90 degrees by 4 p.m. Thursday.
