TRENTON — Power restoration efforts continue on Friday across North Jersey, where some customers have been without power for a week.

JCP&L said Friday afternoon 10,000 customers who lost power across Hunterdon, Morris, Sussex, and Warren during last Friday's nor'easter remain their first priority for restoration. Over 5,000 line crews, tree cutters, and other personnel, some from Louisiana, Texas, and Michigan, are working 16-hour shifts to get the lights back on.

The utility said it would address any new outages based on its priority system that deals with the largest outages first.

"With fair weather predicted in the days ahead, we're confident we will get the job done. In the meantime, we'll continue to keep the lines of communications open as we make further progress," JCP&L president Jim Fakult said in a statement.

On Friday the utility set expected restoration dates for those still without power.

  • All customers who lost power in the first nor'easter will be restored by 11:30 p.m. Saturday.
  • Customers in the most affected areas of North Jersey who lost power on Wednesday should have their service back by 11:30 p.m.  this coming Wednesday
  • Customers who lost power on Wednesday in the rest of JCP&L's service area should be their power back by 11:30 p.m.  Sunday.

As of 2:20 p.m., around  98,000 customers were without power across the state after a high of 338,000 on Wednesday afternoon.

  • JCP&L: 70,733 customers throughout its service area;
  • PSE&G: 26,601 customers, mostly in Bergen, Burlington, Mercer, Middlesex, Somerset, and Union counties;
  • Atlantic City Electric: 495 customers, mostly in Burlington and Camden counties.

PSE&G said it brought in an additional 70 line personnel from utilities in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and 110 contracted tree trimmers.

The utility expected most power to be restored by Saturday. Some customers with damaged individual service lines may not be restored until Sunday.

Gov. Phil Murphy was critical of JCP&L's response on Thursday and said the Board of Public Utilities would examine if all preparedness measures were taken before the first nor'easter on Friday.

"My gut tells me they weren’t," Murphy said. "And if they have not been, this is entirely inexcusable."

How are you affected by the power outages? Contact reporter Dan Alexander at Dan.Alexander@townsquaremedia.com or via Twitter @DanAlexanderNJ.

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