About 44,500 Progress Energy customers in North Carolina are without power as of noon today (Tuesday), the company says. These are the counties with 2,000 or more outages:

Here's the latest update from Progress Energy on the power outages caused by Hurricane Irene, as of 9 a.m. Monday. At the bottom are some contact information, resources and safety pointers for consumers.

Power has now been restored to all of Durham's 20,000 homes hit hard by that crazy evening storm on the evening of July 4. Some were without power until late Sunday morning, according Andy Thompson, a Duke Energy spokesman.

The fierce thunderstorm knocked over power poles and damaged some transformers, necessitating some time-consuming repairs, Thompson said.

"This time of year we see a lot of thunderstorms, and this one caused a lot of damage," Thompson said.
"We had to rebuild our system in some places. It was a lengthy outage anyway you look at it. We really hate that. We appreciate the patience of our customers."

Most of the damage was concentrated in south Durham, Thompson said. In many neighborhoods from the Duke Forest area west towards Orange County, residents spent the weekend clearing brush from their properties, or worse. Some spent Saturday morning on the phone with insurance adjusters and tree-removal services. Others fretted over damage to homes or playground equipment.

In the Carillon Forest neighborhood in western Durham, a tree-removal crew working at one house did a robust business Saturday, as residents from across the neighborhood enlisted their services. At least two homes in that neighborhood were hit by snapped pine trees, and scores of other trees leaned precariously, pointed evidence of the direction and fury of Friday night's winds.