Md. Restoration Efforts Continue 4 Days After Superstorm Sandy

BALTIMORE (WJZ)--Four days after Superstorm Sandy ripped through the East Coast, a massive cleanup effort is still underway in Maryland. There are still those who don't have power. While the vast majority of homes have had their power restored, there are those that are still waiting.

Monique Griego has the latest on the power outage effort.

BGE crews have been working nonstop.  As of Friday afternoon, there were less than 1,000 homes without service.

Four days after Superstorm Sandy whipped through the region, tossing trees and taking out power lines, some neighborhoods are still in the dark.

"We considered the kind of damage we had this time. We've never had the poles bent, trees down like that," said Carolyn Smith, who lost power.

BGE crews, along with out-of-state linemen, have been working around the clock, trying to rebuild the system Mother Nature destroyed.

"It's tough. Look around. There's a lot of tree damage, a lot of poles broken off. A lot of wires down," said Frank Jarowski, BGE worker.

Now they're finally hitting the final stretch of outages, which includes the Northwest Baltimore block Smith lives on.

"Today I came home and I saw the truck and that sign and I believe they were really taking care of business," Smith said.

"Yeah I'm relieved. I hope they get everything done today," said Jeff Jefferson, who lost power.

During the summer derecho storm, BGE was criticized for its response time. But with Sandy they were able to handle things a little differently.

"We knew it was happening. We knew it ahead of time. With the derecho we didn't know. It just all of a sudden came out of nowhere," Jarowski said.

"We were able to start restoring power as the storm was bearing down upon us. That was the difference here without question," said Rob Gould, BGE spokesperson.

BGE is hoping to have almost everyone restored by Friday night. Not only will that make the homeowners happy but utility workers as well.

"The feeling we get when we get everyone back up is tremendous," Jarowski said.

Many of the out-of-state linemen who were here in Baltimore have already left to go help those in New York and New Jersey.

While BGE hopes to have everyone restored, there may be a few scattered outages that may go into the weekend.