Officials were also trying to take stock of the aftermath across the state. “We’ve had a number of tornadoes,” Mr. Cooper, a Democrat, said on “Good Morning America.” “I’m not sure of the count yet.”
The storm is knocking out power over wide areas.
With storm-force winds extending out 140 miles from its center and sustained winds of 70 m.p.h. near its core, Isaias is disrupting electricity service to hundreds of thousands of customers in its path.
As of 8 a.m. Eastern time, about 360,000 utility customers in eastern North Carolina and another 300,000 in Virginia, mainly in the Tidewater region, had lost power, according to Poweroutage.us, a website that tracks and aggregates reports from utilities. There were also scattered outages in Maryland.
Storms can disrupt power in a number of ways. Strong wind gusts can sometimes snap cables and poles directly, though utilities try to build and maintain their infrastructure to be wind-resistant. Often the culprit is a broken tree limb or debris from a building that strikes a power line, or a skidding vehicle hitting a pole. Lightning strikes can damage equipment, and so can wind-driven rain or flash floodwaters.
Downed power lines can remain dangerous even when the lights nearby seem to be out, and wet conditions add to the danger. Utility companies in the region like Dominion Energy warn the public to stay at least 30 feet away, and not to attempt to move them.
Duke Energy, a major utility in North and South Carolina, said on Twitter that it had more than 2,200 workers prepared to respond to power disruptions.
Loss of off-site power caused one reactor at the Brunswick nuclear power plant in Southport, N.C., to automatically shut down overnight, according to a Nuclear Regulatory Commission notice. The plant’s other reactor was unaffected. The report said safety systems worked as intended and the impact of the shutdown was minimal.
