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Power turned back on for hundreds days after storm, but cleanup continues for many

Duke Energy says it fixed hundreds of scattered outages in hard-hit areas Wednesday.

MOORESVILLE, Ind. — Wednesday night, hundreds of people got their power back after being in the dark for days. Duke Energy crews worked for several days to fix downed powerlines from Monday’s severe storms and tornados.

Mooresville was one of the hardest hit areas Monday. The National Weather Service confirmed a tornado traveled east from Conover through Mooresville and into Rowan County.  

Mooresville resident Lindsey Wekenmann told WCNC Charlotte Wednesday she feels incredibly lucky the giant tree in her backyard fell away from her house. 

"I feel like something's watching over us because that’s super crazy how it perfectly landed," Wekenmann said as she pointed to the downed tree. 

She recalled hunkering down inside when the tornado came through and hearing the tree slam to the ground. 

"The wind just sounded like a howl," she added. 

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Wekenmann lost power right as the storm hit Monday evening.

As trees fell across the Carolinas, they took power lines with them. Duke Energy crews worked for several days to free wires from trees and reinstall poles that were knocked over. 

Duke Energy said it takes longer to reach more rural areas and some outages can take hours to fix, leaving people like Wekenmann without power for days. 

"It's not just one outage that impacts a lot of customers," Duke Energy spokesperson Logan Kureczka explained. "It's hundreds and hundreds of individual outages that our crews have to respond to."

Wekenmann and her neighbors finally got their power back around 6 p.m. Wednesday.

🌩️ If you like weather, watch Brad Panovich and the WCNC Charlotte Weather Team on their Emmy Award-winning Weather IQ YouTube channel. 🎥

Duke Energy deployed about 25 crews to the Mooresville area Wednesday to help speed up the work. Almost all outages were repaired by about 9 p.m. 

Wekenmann was happy to see she had working air conditioning and water again. She told WCNC Charlotte the first thing she wanted to do was take a shower. 

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