Power May Not be Restored in Lakewood Until Monday

The power came back on for 4,000 Lakewood residents on Thursday. 

However, there are still nearly 10,000 residents in the dark. 

And, in Lakewood, they may be waiting a few more days — some until Monday night, according to the FirstEnergy website.

There were 9,459 residents without power on Thursday night, according to an outage map. That’s down from more than . 

“We started gaining ground on Wednesday,” said Mayor Michael Summers, who spent much of the week stopping at the scenes of outages. “The biggest gains are the infrastructure repair.”

The only road that remained closed was Lake Road, between Cove and Nicholson avenues, where electric company crews set up a long row of elevated lifts to repair downed lines.

Summers expects that street to be reopened Friday morning.

“We’ll gain ground through the weekend, but there might not be power everywhere right away,” he said.

By late in the afternoon Thursday, about 4,000 residents’ power returned.

As were several Lakewood City Schools buildings that had been dark for most of the week. Classes resumed Friday.

Meanwhile, as the hours turned into days for residents without power, the American Red Cross shelter at Garfield Middle School saw more visitors.

Dennis Pell, the shelter manger for the first couple days during the outage, said there were about 75 people staying at the shelter on Wednesday night.

He expects that number to rise if the power isn’t restored. 

“We have plenty of cots and plenty of food,” he said. “We’re hoping to get the power back. We’ll be here until then.” 

Repair crews from all around the Midwest — spotted all over the city — descended on Lakewood this week.

Many of the local repair crews were dispatched to the East Coast, however Summers said that in any event, repairs could not have begun until the winds died down. 

“We have to remember that, as this storm approached mainland, they knew they would have massive problems,” Summers said.  “There was an attempt to get ahead of it, but they were vulnerable in their backyard. I am sure New Jersey appreciates our crews out there. 

“What did we lose? We may have lost eight hours. We add it all up, they are hard at work, and we’re very grateful.”

According to a statement on the website, FirstEnergy has crews working “around the clock” to restore power to all affected areas.

“The majority of Illuminating Company customers are expected to be restored by 11:59 p.m. on Monday, November 5,” according to the statement.