Utilities rely on out-of-state workers after storm

Published



LEESBURG, Va. (AP) — A fleet of 20 electrical utility trucks, with cranes capable of hoisting a line worker 55 feet above the ground, commandeered the parking lot behind a Hampton Inn in the northern Virginia exurbs of Washington early Tuesday morning.

The sight was familiar in the days following a violent thunderstorm with near-hurricane-force winds that knocked out power to millions of people in the Mid-Atlantic region. But residents and hotel guests might have been surprised by the company name on the trucks — Gulf Power, as in the Gulf of Mexico — and the Florida license plates.

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