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Michigan homes remain without power in wake of Wednesday's storms

A patchwork of national and state regulations require utilities to trim around their power lines. More than a dozen of the country's largest utilities told NPR that falling trees and branches represent a leading cause of outages.
A patchwork of national and state regulations require utilities to trim around their power lines. More than a dozen of the country's largest utilities told NPR that falling trees and branches represent a leading cause of outages.

Tens of thousands of utility customers in Michigan remain without power, after strong storms swept through the state yesterday.

Some lawmakers are questioning just how strong the state's power grid is.

Storms carrying winds of over 60 miles an hour hit a swath of southern and mid-Michigan.

Flooding closed portions of several highways. More than 100,000 people initially lost power.

Officials with utility companies DTE Energy and Consumers Energy say crews worked throughout the night to restore electricity.

DTE also had an emergency generator ready.

But outages remain a consistent issue during severe weather in Michigan.

State lawmakers held hearings about the issue.

Utility officials say they've invested additional millions of dollars to trim trees that could fall on power lines, which they called the major source of outages.

Quinn Klinefelter is a host and Senior News Editor for 101.9 WDET, anchoring midday newscasts and preparing reports for WDET, NPR and the BBC.