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NEW ORLEANS – Nearly 60,000 Entergy customers across Louisiana are without power as Hurricane Barry moves inland.

The approximately 58,000 residents without power stretch across South Louisiana, according to Entergy spokeswoman Lee Sabatini.

More than 2,900 Entergy crews have been mobilized to address the outages.

“As the storm continues to move ashore, crews are facing several challenges, including road and flood-gate closures, impassable roadways due to flooding and high winds preventing the use of bucket trucks in some areas,” Sabatini said. “For their safety, crews cannot operate bucket trucks when winds are 30 mph or higher.”

Residents are encouraged to avoid all downed power lines and flooded areas, especially since submerged energized power lines may not be visible on the surface.

“Safety is of the utmost importance for all of us as this storm moves through the state. Our crews are responding where it is safe to do so,” vice president of distribution operations in Louisiana Melonie Stewart said. “As the storm passes, crews will assess damage and restore service to customers when safety allows. If customers don’t see our crews working near their area, we may be working on an outage in another location that must be repaired to get power to you.”

For up to the minute updates, follow Entergy on Twitter at @EntergyLA and @EntergyNOLA and on Facebook at facebook.com/EntergyLA and facebook.com/EntergyNOLA.