North Carolina power grid attack: Crews work to restore power as authorities investigate

Power is expected to be restored by Thursday after a firearm attack on the power grid last weekend left more than 30,000 homes in a North Carolina county without electricity.

Gov. Roy Cooper provided the update on Moore County on Tuesday, adding, “I hope it’s earlier. I mean, people are really hurting.” Residents are trying to stay warm in temperatures as low as the mid-40s, and struggling to find food, fuel and medication amid store closures.

Some local outlets have reported a spike in crime, involving vandalism and looting.

Authorities said one or more suspects shot up two substations, causing a mass blackout that left 45,000 utility customers without power. The alarming discovery came around 7 p.m. Saturday, after outages began spreading across the region, officials said.

Duke Energy, the company providing service to the area, said technicians are working around the clock to restore power by Thursday.

Federal agencies, including the FBI and the U.S. Department of Energy, are assisting the Moore County Sheriff’s Office and state officials with the investigation.

President Biden said on Tuesday he was briefed on the matter, and that they don’t yet know who is responsible. Investigators also haven’t released a motive.

"So we condemn this apparent attack on critical infrastructure," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday. "Federal law enforcement continues to support the investigation, and we will continue to monitor the situation as that investigation plays out.

"The Department of Energy is working with utilities in the region to ensure they have everything they need to restore power as quickly and safely as possible," she added.

"Early evidence suggests that it was deliberate and the investigation is underway," Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, also said at a separate briefing.

Reporters asked Moore County Sheriff Ronnie Fields about speculation that the attacks were a protest against a planned drag show set for Saturday. Fields responded that law enforcement had not found evidence to support that claim.

But Fields did say the culprit "knew exactly what they were doing to cause the damage and cause the outage that they did.”

Organizers of the drag show at the Sunrise Theater in Southern Pines said they believe they were at the center of the attack, saying that “Far-right activists had been trying to shut down the show for weeks,” and that they even had security at the Saturday night show, the Fayetteville Observer reported.

A state of emergency was put in declared for the area, located east of Charlotte, by the Moore County Board of Commissioners. The board said this will expire Dec. 9 around 5 p.m., unless it needs to be extended.

Duke Energy said it had restored electricity to about 7,000 customers by Monday afternoon. Around 35,000 residents were still without power as of Tuesday, according to Duke’s website.

"We are restoring customers where possible, but the damage is beyond repair in some areas. That leaves us with no option but to replace large pieces of equipment — which is not an easy or quick task,” Jason Hollifield, Duke Energy’s general manager of emergency preparedness, said in a statement.

He added that the company “is committed to getting life back to normal for our customers. We thank them for their patience.”

With the incident raising concerns about vulnerabilities in the U.S. power grid system, Cooper on Tuesday called for an assessment of the state’s critical infrastructure, studying how to improve security and prevent attacks in the future.

The state has sent generators and other supplies, such as food, to Moore County.