Power outage history
Beaufort County North Carolina
11hours
without power for the average customer in a typical year, 2018–2025
41st most of 100 in North Carolina 1.6× the national median
Every day since 2015
Eleven years, one night at a time
Each cell is a day. The brighter it is, the larger the share of Beaufort's customers who were without power at that day's worst moment.
Year by year
Hours in the dark, per customer
2018 was the worst well-recorded year, at 41 hours for the average customer. Hatched years have a thin record and are left out of the averages.
Beaufort, hours without power per customer
The record
The biggest outages since 2015
Ranked by customer-hours lost: customers out multiplied by how long they stayed out. Times are local.
| Began | Storm | Peak out | Share | Lasted | 90% restored | Customer-hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 15, 2018 | Hurricane Florence | 7,573 | 38% | 6.8 d | 4.4 d | 476k |
| Sep 6, 2019 | Hurricane Dorian | 9,310 | 47% | 2.7 d | 48 h | 260k |
| Oct 8, 2016 | Hurricane Matthew | 4,712 | 24% | 3.8 d | 3.4 d | 251k |
| Sep 13, 2018 | Hurricane Florence | 10,377 | 53% | 24 h | 22 h | 186k |
| Aug 4, 2020 | Hurricane Isaias | 9,626 | 49% | 37 h | 26 h | 127k |
| Oct 11, 2018 | Hurricane Michael | 5,003 | 25% | 23 h | 15 h | 44k |
| Sep 23, 2023 | Tropical Storm Ophelia | 6,548 | 33% | 14 h | 8.5 h | 37k |
| Jan 9, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 2,487 | 13% | 18 h | 14 h | 24k |
| Feb 19, 2025 | Winter storm | 2,085 | 11% | 19 h | 12 h | 20k |
| Dec 24, 2022 | No storm report | 3,449 | 17% | 9.5 h | 3.5 h | 18k |
| Mar 12, 2022 | Thunderstorms | 5,883 | 30% | 5.2 h | 3.2 h | 17k |
| Feb 17, 2015 | Ice storm | 1,011 | 5% | 30 h | 25 h | 16k |
| May 30, 2019 | Thunderstorms | 2,400 | 12% | 8.2 h | 7.2 h | 16k |
| Feb 7, 2020 | No storm report | 5,616 | 28% | 7.8 h | 5.0 h | 15k |
| Jun 27, 2023 | Thunderstorms | 4,317 | 22% | 8.0 h | 4.5 h | 12k |
| Oct 30, 2025 | No storm report | 2,661 | 13% | 4.2 h | 48 min | 11k |
| Oct 10, 2018 | No storm report | 3,156 | 16% | 3.0 h | 2.8 h | 9.5k |
| Dec 23, 2022 | Windstorm | 1,317 | 7% | 14 h | 9.8 h | 9.0k |
| Jan 4, 2018 | Winter storm | 1,598 | 8% | 9.2 h | 5.8 h | 8.9k |
| May 10, 2024 | Thunderstorms | 1,590 | 8% | 12 h | 9.2 h | 8.6k |
| Jun 1, 2018 | No storm report | 6,011 | 30% | 1.8 h | 1.2 h | 8.0k |
| Jun 24, 2018 | Thunderstorms | 935 | 5% | 9.0 h | – | 7.8k |
| May 31, 2019 | Thunderstorms | 1,460 | 7% | 14 h | 13 h | 7.5k |
| Apr 30, 2023 | Thunderstorms | 1,968 | 10% | 5.0 h | 3.5 h | 6.9k |
| Jul 23, 2020 | No storm report | 7,252 | 37% | 1.0 h | 48 min | 6.8k |
| Dec 18, 2018 | No storm report | 3,136 | 16% | 2.0 h | 30 min | 5.7k |
| Jan 12, 2021 | No storm report | 1,769 | 9% | 5.8 h | 5.5 h | 5.3k |
| Feb 21, 2020 | Winter storm | 890 | 5% | 16 h | – | 4.5k |
| Mar 2, 2018 | No storm report | 1,586 | 8% | 4.8 h | 2.8 h | 4.4k |
| Dec 17, 2023 | Flooding | 1,863 | 9% | 2.8 h | 2.2 h | 4.2k |
After the peak
How fast the lights come back
Each line is one major outage, from its peak. The amber line is the typical path.
When it happens
The outage clock
Customer-hours out by month (rings, January innermost) and local hour, 2018–2025.
What was happening
Weather behind the outages
Each outage is matched to NOAA storm reports for Beaufort from twelve hours before it began to its peak. Matching shows coincidence, not proof of cause.
- Tropical storm 73%
- No storm on record 16%
- Thunderstorms 7.9%
- Winter storm 2.2%
- Windstorm 0.6%
Who keeps the lights on
Utilities serving Beaufort
As each utility reports to the Energy Information Administration for its whole North Carolina territory, not this county alone. Outage minutes include major storm days.
| Utility | Type | Outage min / yr | Excl. major storms | Outages / yr | Residential ¢/kWh | Customers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Duke Energy Progress | Investor Owned | 183 | 145 | 1.41 | 15.2 | 1.4M |
| Virginia Electric & Power Co | Investor Owned | 286 | 137 | 1.49 | 12.7 | 109k |
| Tideland Electric Member Corp | Cooperative | 205 | 164 | 2.49 | 16.4 | 22k |
| City of Washington | Municipal | – | – | – | 13.0 | 12k |
| Edgecombe-Martin County E M C | Cooperative | 104 | 104 | 1.18 | 16.5 | 11k |
| Town of Belhaven | NC | – | – | – | – | 9.1k |
EIA Form 861, latest year each utility reported. Outage minutes are SAIDI, the yearly minutes the average customer goes without power; outages a year are SAIFI.
Next door
Neighbouring counties
About these numbers
Notes
Outages come from the EAGLE-I record of utility outage maps collected every 15 minutes by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Hours without power are customer-hours divided by the county's 19,720 electricity customers. Averages use well-covered years from 2018. Outages shorter than 15 minutes, and utilities that publish no outage map, are not in the record, so these figures understate the total. How every number is made →