AUGUSTA, Ga. () – The winter storm has brought some power outages to our area, and crews are preparing for more overnight.

Aiken Electric Cooperative and Georgia Power are working to ensure your lights stay on and that you stay warm during this winter weather.

Aiken Electric CO-Op crews were ready for power outages in the counties north of I-20.  But they got busy when the sleet and freezing rain picked up in Aiken County.

“The counties that we’ve seen it in sort of surprised us. In looking the last couple of days of all the forecast it was all above I20,” said Gary Stooksbury, CEO of Aiken Electrical Cooperative. “McCormick, Saluda, and Edgefield District of our service territory, but this afternoon when we started having some outages, they were all in Aiken County.”

They say they’re working as quickly as they can to get power back on to all of their customers.  And they have crews on standby in case they’re needed overnight.

“The operations and engineering department will make a decision later on tonight. Do we need them or not? The good thing about these types of resources is if we tell them we don’t need them and then 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning something changes, they’re nothing more than a phone call away,” said Stooksbury.

Georgia Power also has crews working on power outages.  And they say just because you may not see their trucks, they’re still staying on top of any power outages.

“So, we kind of have to wait until the system has completely moved, but don’t be alarmed because we still are working,” said Amanda Arnold, Georgia Power Spokesperson. “We are working from our mobile command centers, using our smart grade technology. Things like that to make sure that when outages occur, we’re still working remotely to try and get the power restored.”

If you would like to look at the outage map or report an outage, you can find out how on the Georgia Powers website or Aiken Electrical Cooperative’s website.