Thaw speeds work of N.C. power crews

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Utility repair crews made more progress Saturday at restoring electricity to hundreds of thousands of customers blacked out by a major ice storm, as National Guard troops searched for people needing help.

Gov. Mike Easley went on a three-city tour Saturday to survey damage from one of the worst winter storms in state history, before he was even able to get a good look at his own home.

One of the places on Easley's itinerary in Charlotte was a shelter where 84-year-old Anne Mills was playing checkers with 7-year-old Steve McCorkle.

"I've been here since the morning of the storm and I sure as hell want some clean clothes," Mills said.

Temperatures climbed into the 40s for a second day, helping melt any ice remaining from the storm that arrived Wednesday on a path that took it from the southern Plains into the Northeast. At least 29 deaths were blamed on the storm and its aftermath.

The latest casualties, a 79-year-old man from Shelby and a 31-year-old man in Durham, died of carbon monoxide poisoning as they tried to heat their frozen homes, police said. Their bodies were discovered Saturday.

More than 200 others have sought medical help for carbon monoxide poisoning since the devastating ice storm -- many of them Hispanic or Asian immigrants who commonly heated homes with cooking fuels in their native countries, authorities said.

Some 300 National Guard volunteers fanned out Saturday into some of the hardest hit areas to knock on doors and ask residents if they had heat or power.

"That's why we've got the Guard out -- we don't know if people are getting the information or not. They don't have televisions and a lot don't even have a radio with batteries," the governor said.

The National Guard troops were cruising streets and knocking on doors, Capt. Robert Carver said.

"What we're asking people is pretty simple. 'Do you have heat? Do you have power? Do you want to go to a shelter? If you do want to go to a shelter, do you have a way to get there, do you have transportation?"' Carver said.

Friday night, 2,028 people stayed in 67 shelters across the state as temperatures dropped into the teens in some places.

Mills had resisted moving from her home of 52 years, where she lives alone. She called the Fire Department Thursday to ask for a blanket and a cup of hot coffee. Firefighters, who knew her from previous calls for help, warned her that she'd freeze to death if she stayed in her unheated home.

"They said, 'This is one time you're going,"' Mills said. "They were the sweetest, nicest -- I've never known anybody as nice as those firemen."

Utility officials said they had made progress at fixing broken power lines, but nearly 1.1-million customers -- homes and businesses -- remained without electricity Saturday in North and South Carolina. Utility officials acknowledged Friday that many customers wouldn't have power back until Wednesday.

Duke Power said it had about 750,000 customers without power in North Carolina and South Carolina. Carolina Power & Light had 181,000 North Carolina customers without power. North Carolina's electric cooperatives reported 50,380 outages.

The governor's mansion suffered no structural damage, but Easley said he hadn't yet had time to fully inspect his own home in Raleigh.

"It's holding up a couple of trees," Easley said.

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