Several Oauchita County residents were without power and roadways say numerous downed trees from significant accumulations of ice Thursday morning as overnight freezing rain took its toll on South Arkansas.
Chris Wasson of Entergy stated, " The Camden area saw a peak of 3,500 customer outages at 10:45am on February 2nd.Damage has been largely due to ice accumulating on trees and causing those trees and limbs to fall on our facilities. We have over 75 additional resources to assist this area in restoration.
"At this point, we are still assessing damage and making repairs as safely and efficiently as possible. Currently, I don't have a solid estimate of when all customers will be restored. We will continue to make updates to Estimate Restoration Times (ERTs) as we know more information."
" As of 4pm on February 2nd, approximately 942 customers have been restored with about 2,558 outages remaining. The areas with the most damage have been southeast Camden, northeast Camden, & Chidester. At this point we have assessed 30% of the damages and expect to have damage assessment completed by noon Saturday, February 4th."
Ouachita County Judge Robert McAdoo stated via Facebook. , "Trees are down everywhere. County, City, ARDOT crews are working diligently to get roads opened back up. Please be thankful for everyone working as first responders to attempt to get life back to normal. Please, do not travel unless necessary. Stay inside, it is bad outside because of [trees] falling everywhere from the ice."
Several school districts took AMI days and churches opened up their doors as warming centers.
Friday's forecast calls for increasing clouds, with a high near 44 , wind chill values as low as 19, and north- northeast wind 5 to 10 mph with gusts as high as 20 mph.
Friday night will be mostly clear, with a low around 22 and a northeast wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening.
