Pitch black, stagnant air, and cold showers were just the start for some people affected by power outages.

The panic started for Tampa Bay residents almost a week prior to the storm. Many residents in the Tampa Bay Area lost power due to the hit of Hurricane Irma early Monday, September 11th. Some lost power for days on ends but some never lost power.

Many residents in Pinellas County depend on Duke Energy for their power. Multiple customers felt that Duke was unreliable, and that their service was slow and unorganized.

According to Fox 13, Duke Energy failed to restore power to all of Pinellas County before midnight on Friday. Overall they have restored power to 1.2 million customers in Florida, within 4 days. They are trying their best to restore power to the remaining customers.

Freshman Marissa D’Alessandro and Dalton Meidling were some of the customers who remained without power for multiple days.

D’Alessandro said she gained power late Friday night around 10:00 pm, “It was really hot and hard to see my surroundings during the nights.”

Meidling lost power Monday night and didn’t get power back until Saturday night. “For days we had to take cold showers and find our way through the dark house,” said Meidling.

Fortunately, some residents such as freshman Hailey Fort, had power throughout the whole storm.

According to Washington Post, “20.6 million residents” in the state of Florida were without power. Duke felt it was necessary to restore power to the more crucial facilities such as hospitals and schools first.

All over the state of Florida many households were without power. This was unfortunate and created various obstacles. However, we must be thankful that we didn’t experience what was predicted, and didn’t endure more major damages.