Little by little, power is being restored on the Garden Isle. The Kauaʻi Island Utility Cooperative is still cautioning customers to plan for extended outages as repairs to its system are underway. HPR spoke with KIUC’s spokesperson Beth Amaro, who described what their crews saw after a flyover yesterday.
"We are already working on restoring the transmission system," she said. "We were able to actually get a number of people back into service since yesterday, about 9,000 of our members."
Amaro says that KIUC aims to complete transmission repairs by tomorrow. She added that the company's power-generating facilities are in stable condition.
"It's not keeping us from being able to generate power," she said. "That is not the problem right now."
As part of KIUC's recovery efforts, crews are working to address downed power lines, which Amaro says can be difficult in remote areas.
"They are working extremely hard," she said. "They're extremely committed, and they take a lot of pride in being able to get our community back up and running."
While most of the island's facilities have adequate emergency power, KIUC is still working to restore power in all areas, especially those with the highest population density. In the meantime, Amaro says it's important for people to take care of their mental health.
"I'm so heartened to see in our communities how everybody is banding together," she said. "Myself, I went home last night for the first time since the onset of the storm, and in our neighborhood, everybody is walking around talking to each other, making sure we're okay."
"Maybe what comes out of this as a positive is we're all a little more closely connected, and we're all reminded to look out for each other. So that's important, too, take care of your mental and emotional needs as well as your physical needs."
This story aired on The Conversation on Sept. 9, 2026. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. Annabelle Ink adapted this story for the web.
