Panama City, Fl - Aug. 23, 2008 - Tropical Storm Fay made its fourth landfall early Saturday morning, moving onshore in Northwest Florida just southwest of Carrabelle, Fla. Approximately 626 Gulf Power customers were without electricity as of 10 a.m. Saturday.

As of 10 a.m., customers reported the following number of outages per county:

• Bay County — 74
• Calhoun County — 1
• Escambia County — 356
• Holmes County — 1
• Jackson County — 2
• Okaloosa County — 2
• Santa Rosa County — 151
• Washington County — 39

Heavy rain and flooding will continue today, impacting the Florida Panhandle, southwestern Georgia, southern Alabama, and southeastern Mississippi. Over the next few days, rainfall totals of 5 to 10 inches will be common, with locally higher amounts.

"We will work with Emergency Management personnel and restore service to critical customers like hospitals, sewer lift stations and police and fire stations as quickly as possible," John Hutchinson, Public Affairs manager, said. "We ask everyone to please be patient. Fay is a slow moving storm and there will likely be outages. We’ll be able to respond to those outages until winds reach 35 mph. At that time our crews will need to seek shelter until winds return to below 35 mph. We don’t expect widespread outages, but they may last a few hours because of the slow moving system hampering out efforts to work."

Gulf Power is able to detect most widespread outages during a storm and customers should wait a reasonable time before calling in an outage report. The company encourages customers to call 1-800-GU-POWER (487-6937) for reporting outages.

Please keep the following in mind as Fay passes through Northwest Florida.

After the storm hits

• Stay away from all downed lines. Warn others to do the same and contact Gulf Power or a local law enforcement agency.
• If there is damage to your meter box or the pole attached to your meter box, you must first have an electrician make repairs before Gulf Power can restore your service.
• Wait a reasonable time before calling Gulf Power if your entire neighborhood is without power. Gulf Power can detect most widespread outages electronically without customers calling in. Extra calls jam switchboards and slow repairs. Please make only one call.
• Before neighborhood lines can be worked on, Gulf Power crews must first repair larger lines that bring power to population centers. So don’t expect to see work crews in your neighborhoods immediately after a storm.
• Do not connect portable generators to your household electrical wiring. This can cause serious injury to you and to Gulf Power employees. Instead plug appliances into the generator.
• Turn off large appliances and air conditioners and wait 10 to 15 minutes after power has been restored before turning them back on. This prevents a power surge from shutting down electricity again.
• Please be patient. Don’t stop Gulf Power crews to report an outage or ask for information. Before neighborhood lines can be worked on, Gulf Power crews must first repair larger lines that bring power to neighborhoods. The crews are working as safely and as fast as they can.

You can find important information to help you prepare for a storm as well as get information after the storm on by visiting Gulf Power's Web site at www.gulfpower.com.

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MEDIA CONTACTS:

John Hutchinson: 850-444-6750, cell 850-324-0099

Lynn Erickson: 850-444-6249, cell 850-293-4614

Jeff Rogers: 850-444-6243, cell 850-572-5511

Media line: 800-621-6688