'I have to count my blessings' | Amelia community deals with impacts of days-long power outage after Helene

AMELIA, Ohio — Several days after the remnants of Helene hit the Tri-State, Duke Energy crews spent Monday restoring power for thousands of people who were still without it.

When Helene hit Friday, it knocked out power for roughly 140,000 people that day.

As of Monday morning, there were still about 4,000 people still in the dark.

That included hundreds of people who live in a mobile home park in Amelia. A large tree fell down during Friday's storms, knocking out power for the entire community. That tree also hit someone's home and destroyed a pick-up truck.

WCPO 9 saw Duke Energy crews working in the area trying to restore power. The crews not only cut away the tree that has been in the road for days, but they also had to replace power poles.

"It was a beautiful sight, it was a beautiful sight," said Anthony Ruschman, who lost power Friday. "I got tired of seeing that tree."

On Monday, residents in the community were also dealing with the effects of the days-long power outage.

"It stinks really bad," Alli Gibson said.

Some residents started throwing out all of the food that spoiled over the weekend.

"The food is the hard part to handle, because you know, it's kind of hard to get it built up and lose it all," Lisa Featherkioe said.

We saw her helping Gibson throw out the hundreds of dollars worth of groceries.

"I have to count my blessings, you know, there's people off worse than I am right now," Featherkioe said. "Fingers crossed, we'll have our power back on tonight."

"Florida, North Carolina, Tennessee they're a lot worse off than we are," said Anthony Ruschman, who also lost power Friday. "Even without these basic necessities, something that not many people think of, we got closer to our family. This is just a bump in the road, that's all this is."