After Hurricane Florence, FPL crews left SWFL homes to help restore power in N. Carolina

If you asked John Wendel, he’d tell you: “You’re there because something’s wrong.”

Wendel, of Naples, was one of 900 employees and contractors Florida Power & Light sent to North Carolina for repair and restoration efforts on behalf of Duke Energy.

And they went, of course, because something was indeed wrong. Or at least it was about to be.

"I love my job," the 57-year-old Florida Power Line worker, John Wendel said. Wendel was one among the 900 employees who were deployed to North Carolina during hurricane Florence. As a young child, Wendel always knew he loved adventure. "That is why I love going on these hurricane trips," he said. "Because it is an adventure."

The National Hurricane Center named Florence as a tropical storm in the Atlantic Ocean on Sept. 1 and a hurricane Sept. 4. It weakened and then strengthened over the next week, before making landfall in North Carolina on Sept. 14 as a Category 1 hurricane.

As the storm approached, FPL crews took their equipment north as part of a mutual assistance agreement decided prior to the storm season, FPL spokesman Bill Orlove said. FPL workers left Sept. 11 for Charlotte, North Carolina, on a trip that took two days.

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“Our crews are well-trained; they’re battle-trained,” Orlove said, noting they have dealt with hurricanes before.

Hurricane Florence caused flooding that put streets underwater and infiltrated homes. Rivers and other waterways swelled. The bill for the property damage is huge — estimates exceed tens of billions — but the emotional toll is incalculable.

Tens of thousands of pre-staged workers waited the storm out. Wendel, 57, a senior line specialist, said it was “a lot of waiting” before they could get to work.

And so they did.

From 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., workers plugged away at restoring power to homes and then went back to their sites to eat, wash up and sleep. There were trailers with 36 bunks stacked three high for the workers to sleep in, Wendel said, and portable toilets, shower trailers and a mess tent, too.

FPL construction foreman Scott Hall, 51, of Punta Gorda, said it reminded him a bit of the Army, where he spent eight years.

The work, Hall said, was deliberate. They’d start from the substation and work their way down the lines. They were methodical and careful to make sure everything was connected and safe to avoid damage, he said.

Their job wasn't easy. Some poles had snapped. Other places, trees had taken the wires down to the ground. In others, lines were loose. And, both Hall and Wendel noted, it was wet. Very wet.

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But the workers kept plugging away, despite the physical demands.

“You get focused on what the job is,” Wendel said.

And though it can be emotionally draining, Hall said, “You really don’t have time to be homesick.”

The people to whom workers were restoring power were grateful. They brought water and food for the workers — in North Carolina, they loved to bring boiled peanuts, Hall said. After they had restored power to a neighborhood and the trucks were leaving, people would line up on the side of the road and clap.

It made Hall feel a little bad, he said, because bystanders would still try to help despite their plight.

“Some of them just lost everything,” Hall said.

FPL restoration crews were gone from Sept. 11 until Sept. 23.

Despite the long assignment, Hall knew he had a job to do, regardless of the conditions.

“You do whatever you have to do,” he said.