SWEPCO restores power to customers affected by this week's storms

SHREVEPORT, La. -- SWEPCO has restored power to a majority of the customers affected by this week's thunderstorms.

Outages have been reduced from about 37,000 customers to fewer than 500 remaining. 

All customers who can receive power should have it by day's end, the company said. 

"First and foremost, thank you to our customers and communities for their patience, understanding and support throughout this restoration effort. We know extended outages are challenging, and we appreciate the grace shown to our crews as they worked around the clock through difficult conditions to restore service safely," the company said in a news release.

"We're also incredibly grateful to the hundreds of lineworkers, contractors and support personnel who answered the call and traveled from near and far to help restore power. A special thank you to our AEP family members from AEP Texas, Public Service Company of Oklahoma (PSO), and SWEPCO teams from the Texarkana, Longview and Fayetteville districts, as well as contractor partners from LineTec Services, APEX, DHE, Primoris, Shelton, Mettle, AMP, Axis, Chain, Northstar, 3S and Tempest. Their commitment, professionalism and dedication helped bring power back to our communities as safely and quickly as possible," the release states.

Initial damage assessments indicate the storms Monday and Tuesday caused widespread damage across the region, with powerful winds bringing down trees, damaging poles and electrical equipment, and creating outages in multiple communities at once.