BREC Monitoring Helene

PICKENS, South Carolina — Blue Ridge Electric Cooperative (BREC) is closely monitoring the impact Hurricane Helene will have on our service area beginning Thursday.

BREC officials have met throughout the week to prepare all in-house and outside crews to respond to potential outages. As of Wednesday afternoon, the National Weather Service office based in Greenville-Spartanburg projects parts of Greenville, Oconee and Pickens counties to receive up to 12 inches of rain through early Saturday morning. Some models have also reported the potential for wind gusts of up to 60 mph, which would harm the utility’s infrastructure. The public should stay away from downed power lines. Members should prepare for prolonged outages.

BREC Members are encouraged to follow the outage map online for the most up-to-date information. Outages can be reported through the mobile app or by calling (888) 258-3743 (1-888-BLUERIDGE).

Blue Ridge is reporting around 500 outages as of early Thursday morning in their service area; Duke Energy is reporting several hundred outages in Anderson, Oconee, Pickens and Greenville Counties.