ATLANTA – Southern Company has sent nearly 2,000 distribution and transmission line personnel, engineers, damage assessment workers and support contractors to areas of Florida hardest hit by Hurricane Charley.

Southern Company crews from its operating companies – Georgia Power, Alabama Power, Gulf Power, Mississippi Power and Savannah Electric – are assisting Progress Energy, Florida Power & Light and TECO in their storm restoration efforts in the southwest, north and central Florida cities of Englewood, Daytona, Fort Myers, Sanford, Winter Haven, Avon Park, Wauchula, Fort Meade and north Orlando.

Southern Company expects its crews to remain in Florida for at least a week.

About 800,000 customers remain without power today as a result of Hurricane Charley.

With more than 4 million customers and nearly 39,000 megawatts of generating capacity, Atlanta-based Southern Company (NYSE: SO) is the premier super-regional energy company in the Southeast and a leading U.S. producer of electricity. Southern Company owns electric utilities in four states, a growing competitive generation company, an energy services business and a competitive retail natural gas business, as well as fiber optics and wireless communications. Southern Company brands are known for excellent customer service, high reliability and retail electric prices that are 15 percent below the national average. Southern Company has been named three consecutive years No. 1 on Fortune magazine’s “America’s Most Admired Companies” list in the Electric and Gas Utility industry. Southern Company has been ranked the nation’s top energy utility in the American Customer Satisfaction Index five years in a row. Southern Company has more than 500,000 shareholders, making its common stock one of the most widely held in the United States. Visit the Southern Company Web site at www.southerncompany.com.

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