August 26, 2005
FPL begins assessment process following Hurricane Katrina

Restoration already underway in densely populated Miami-Dade and Broward

En español

MIAMI, Fla. – Following the departure from South Florida of a surprisingly destructive Hurricane Katrina, Florida Power & Light Company personnel immediately began assessing damage to the electrical infrastructure in densely populated Broward and Miami-Dade County. FPL said nearly 1,453,000 million customers lost power as a result of the storm. Early restoration efforts have returned service to approximately 350,000, leaving 1.1 million customers still without electricity.

“We urge our customers to take extra precautions to be safe,” said Geisha Williams, FPL vice president of distribution. “Please don’t let children play outside, especially in standing water where a downed power line could be energized and dangerous.”

FPL activated its emergency storm plan well in advance of Hurricane Katrina making landfall, and crews and support personnel were able to begin some assessment and restoration in the early morning hours today. As a result FPL said they are planning to provide preliminary estimated restoration times by later this afternoon of when customers can expect power to be restored.

“As a result of our early assessment, we will be setting some aggressive restoration goals in an effort to get everyone’s lives back to normal as quickly as possible,” Williams said. “We hope to be able to share those estimates later today.”

Currently Miami-Dade County has approximately 648,300 customers without service, while Broward County has about 468,900. Palm Beach was less impacted and currently has about 17,700 customers without power. The path of the storm, which ended up curving into southern Miami-Dade County and the actual intensity of the storm, are the reasons so many residents of South Florida have lost electrical service. FPL serves 2.5 million homes and businesses in the three southeast counties of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach.

FPL has assembled a workforce of 11,700 people to restore power, including 7,600 FPL field and support workers and 4,100 out-of-state line and tree personnel. Out-of-state workers are already traveling to South Florida from pre-storm staging sites in Central Florida.

“We understand how much our customers depend on electricity to carry out their responsibilities and get through their day and we ask our customers’ patience while we restore full electric service as quickly as we can. We will stay on the job – and work around the clock -- until we have restored power to every customer who received storm damage.

“Our goal is clear: safe and prompt restoration of all storm-related outages,” Williams said.

FPL begins its restoration process by repairing the major power lines that carry power to towns and communities. At the same time, the company begins to restore power to critical infrastructure to facilitate the emergency response work of police, fire, hospital, water and sewer, transportation and communications personnel. Concurrently, FPL repairs electrical facilities that restore the greatest number of customers as quickly and safely as possible. Finally, it restores small groups and individual customers who, in some cases, have localized damage that requires more extensive attention.

FPL said all of its power plants and its major transmission lines weathered the storm with only minor problems. Port Everglades Unit 1 is the only unit off-line due to Katrina and it is expected back in service tomorrow. The company does not anticipate any problems providing adequate electricity to customers in the company’s 35-county Florida service territory who currently have electric service.

FPL reminded customers that its systems alerts the company to where power is out, so that if you have called to report an outage, a record has been created and it is not necessary to call again. If you see a downed line that is clearly sparking and dangerous, please report it by calling FPL at 1-800-4OUTAGE.

Stay tuned to local radio, TV and newspapers for specific reports on FPL’s progress in assessing and repairing damage to the electrical system in your area.

Florida Power & Light Company is the principal subsidiary of FPL Group, Inc. (NYSE: FPL), nationally known as a high quality, efficient and customer-driven organization focused on energy-related products and services. With annual revenues of more than $10 billion and a growing presence in 26 states, FPL Group is widely recognized as one of the country's premier power companies. Florida Power & Light Company serves 4.3 million customer accounts in Florida. FPL Energy, LLC, FPL Group's wholesale electricity generating subsidiary, is a leader in producing electricity from clean and renewable fuels. Additional information is available on the Internet at www.FPL.com, www.FPLGroup.com and www.FPLEnergy.com.