Dec. 4 (UPI) — More than 42,000 customers are without power in North Carolina after an apparent incident of vandalism cut power in Moore County, N.C. on Saturday night.
The outage continued Sunday with officials investigating the incident as a “criminal occurrence” according to the Moore County Sheriff’s Office.
“As utility companies began responding to the different substations, evidence was discovered that indicated that intentional vandalism had occurred at multiple sites,” the department posted on its Facebook page.
The sheriff’s office said the outage was reported at about 7 p.m. EST Saturday. There are multiple agencies responding throughout the county and securing the site of the alleged vandalism. Gov. Roy Cooper said state law enforcement is joining the investigation and the state “will provide support as needed.”
The total mumber of outages in North Carolina at 2 p.m. was 42,112, according to Poweroutages.us.
There are more than 38,000 Duke Energy customers still without power. About 11,000 outages in Southern Pines, 11,000 near the Village of Pinehurst, 5,000 in Aberdeen and 2,000 near Carthage.
Duke Energy spokesperson Jeff Brooks said there are multiple failures across multiple substations in the area of the outage, according to CBS 17 Raleigh. He confirmed the company is investigating incidents of vandalism.
U.S. Rep. Richard Hudson, R-NC, said the FBI has been involved in the investigation as he thanked law enforcement officials for their response to the incident.
“Last night, unknown individuals vandalized at least two substations in Moore County with criminal intent. Motive for this crime remains unknown.”
He said the Southern Pines Police Department is opening its community room for people to charge their electronic devices while they wait for power to be restored.
According to ABC 11 Raleigh-Durham, power is expected to be restored by 10 p.m. Sunday.
Duke Energy is based in Charlotte, N.C., and has about 8.2 million customers across the six states it serves.
Moore County is located in central North Carolina northwest of Fayetteville.
