JUNO BEACH, Fla. – Within just 12 hours of the last remnant of Hurricane Nicole leaving the state, Florida Power & Light Company (FPL) restored power to more than 95% of customers affected by the rare November storm.
As of 8 a.m., FPL has restored power to more than 465,000 customers, with roughly 18,000 customers without service.
“While our brave men and women have made tremendous progress in short order, we are laser-focused on the remaining customers who are without power,” said Eric Silagy, chairman and CEO of FPL. “We will not stop working until every customer is restored, and I urge everyone to keep safety top of mind as we complete restoration.”
Following FPL’s rapid restoration in the southern part of the state, FPL continues to move additional resources into the hardest hit areas of the state, including Brevard County, where about 15,000 outages remain this morning.
In areas close to where Nicole made landfall, crews are likely to contend with significant tree damage to get access to neighborhood power lines and other electrical infrastructure that serve only a handful of customers.
Nicole – the first November hurricane to make landfall in Florida since 1985 – came ashore near Vero Beach as a Category 1 hurricane early Thursday before slicing through the state as a strong tropical storm with damaging winds and heavy rain. Nicole’s final tropical storm-force winds ended in Florida around 8 p.m. Thursday.
FPL amassed a workforce of about 13,000 men and women to support the restoration effort, including mutual assistance from 16 states.
FPL’s long-term program of hardening the energy grid benefited customers during Nicole. Initial assessments confirm that underground neighborhood power lines performed significantly better than overhead neighborhood lines, as was the case six weeks earlier during Hurricane Ian. Smart grid technology also helped avoid tens of thousands of customer outages during Nicole, according to initial data.
Immediately after a storm, FPL knows if main power lines have been damaged. If customers believe their power is out for this reason, there is no need to contact FPL. Customers should call 911 or FPL at 1-800-4OUTAGE (1-800-468-8243) only to report dangerous situations such as downed power lines or sparking electrical equipment. Customers can report an outage at FPL.com/Outage or on the FPL app.
Additional resources
Customers can download the FPL app for on-the-go, instant and secure access to their accounts. Customers can report or get the latest information on an outage. The app is available for download in the iOS App Store and Google Play. To quickly download the FPL app, text the word “App” to MyFPL (69375). Customers also can sign up for storm updates by texting the word “Join” to MyFPL (69375).
How to stay informed
FPL communicates restoration information to customers frequently through the news media and the following resources:
- FPL website: FPL.com
- Twitter: twitter.com/insideFPL
- Facebook: facebook.com/FPLconnect
- FPL app: Download from the App Store or Google Play, or text the word “App” to MyFPL (69375)
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Florida Power & Light Company
As America’s largest electric utility, Florida Power & Light Company serves more customers and sells more power than any other utility, providing clean, affordable, reliable electricity to approximately 5.8 million accounts, or more than 12 million people. FPL operates one of the cleanest power generation fleets in the U.S. and in 2021 won the ReliabilityOne® National Reliability Award for the sixth time in the last seven years. The company received the top ranking in the southern U.S. among large electric providers, according to J.D. Power’s 2021 Electric Utility Residential Customer Satisfaction StudySM and 2021 Electric Utility Business Customer Satisfaction StudySM. The company was also recognized in 2020 as one of the most trusted U.S. electric utilities by Escalent for the seventh consecutive year. FPL is a subsidiary of Juno Beach, Florida-based NextEra Energy, Inc. (NYSE: NEE), a clean energy company widely recognized for its efforts in sustainability, corporate responsibility, ethics and compliance, and diversity. NextEra Energy is ranked No. 1 in the electric and gas utilities industry in Fortune’s 2022 list of “World’s Most Admired Companies” and recognized on Fortune’s 2021 list of companies that “Change the World.” NextEra Energy is also the parent company of NextEra Energy Resources, LLC, which, together with its affiliated entities, is the world’s largest generator of renewable energy from the wind and sun and a world leader in battery storage. For more information about NextEra Energy companies, visit these websites: www.NextEraEnergy.com, www.FPL.com, www.NextEraEnergyResources.com.
