LANSING — Thousands of homes and businesses across the Lansing region were without power Saturday as a winter storm moved through the area.
The region is under a winter storm warning that began Friday and is scheduled to end at 7 p.m. Saturday, with more snow and high winds expected to continue through Saturday before frigid temperatures set in for the next several days. The storm caused a rush to stores for local residents stocking up on supplies.
On Friday evening, Ingham County officials urged people not to travel as multiple crashes were reported as road conditions quickly deteriorated after dark.
Consumers Energy had the most customers without power, about more than 71,000 across the state as of 7:30 a.m. Saturday, according to the company’s online outage map. About 5,000 of those customers were in the Lansing area, with major outages in the Grand Ledge, DeWitt, Ovid-Elsie, Bath, Laingsburg, Holt and Eaton Rapids areas. Restoration times varied from midday Saturday to early Sunday morning, although a handful of outages had undetermined times for repair.
DTE Energy, which serves customers in southeast Ingham County and southeast Michigan, said it had 103,000 customers without power, including about 250 homes and businesses between Williamston and Fowlerville, according to the online outage map. No restoration times were indicated.
MORE: Michigan power outage maps: How to check your status in the Lansing area
The Lansing Board of Water & Light had scattered outages overnight but as of 7:30 a.m. Saturday had just one customer without power in the Old Everett Neighborhood in south Lansing, according to the company’s online outage map.
Portland-based Tri-County Electric, which has about 25,000 rural electric customers between northern Jackson County and Reed City, said it had just over 700 outages. The company’s largest Lansing area outage was 175 customers in the Portland area, but there were scattered outages in the Stockbridge, Mason and Westphalia areas and other smaller outages in and around Portland. The electric cooperative did not list restoration times.
MORE: How much snow will we get? Here are the latest projections
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