By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

BAHAMAS Power and Light has restored electricity to approximately 98 per cent of customers in New Providence and has completed restoration efforts in the Family Islands, the company said.

Full restoration was reached in Andros, one of three islands hardest hit by Hurricane Matthew, on Monday, BPL said in a statement. The company said it expects full restoration in New Providence before the end of the week.

BPL said as of Monday, the company had less than 1,000 of its approximately 81,000 New Providence customers without supply following Hurricane Matthew. Those 1,000 customers represent a mixture of customers with individual service issues and those whose supply could not be restored without prior approval from the Ministry of Works, BPL said.

Nonetheless, BPL said company officials expected that number to decrease by the end of working hours on Monday night, adding that BPL had “substantially completed” major restoration work across New Providence by that time.

BPL CEO Pamela Hill said she is “especially proud of BPL’s team that worked as hard as it did since the storm’s departure.”

“These men and women did an awesome job,” she said. “The National Hurricane Centre suggests that storms of this magnitude could result in outages lasting weeks to months. Interestingly, the US, which didn’t get a direct hit from this storm still has thousands of customers without power along the eastern seaboard.

“To be so close to full restoration nationwide in this timeframe shows our commitment to getting our customers’ power restored as quickly and safely as we can. Those were basically our only priorities since the storm hit.

“Just as aggressive as we have been, we will continue to be. Our goal is to reconnect the supply of every customer who can get power. We want to thank all of our customers who have been patient and supportive through this entire process and we want the Bahamian people to know we are and will continue to work for them,” she said.