Baldwin County Power Outages: What Sally and Ivan Taught Us

Hurricane Sally — September 16, 2020

Sally came ashore near Gulf Shores early on September 16, 2020, as a Category 2 hurricane with sustained winds of 110 mph. It was not the wind that defined it — it was the stall. Sally crawled, and the rain gauge at Orange Beach recorded 29.99 inches before it was over. Power restoration numbers tell the story of what a slow storm does to a coastal grid:

• More than 71,000 households and businesses in southern and central Baldwin County lost power — 95% of the service area of Baldwin EMC, the local electric cooperative.
• Only 5 of the co-op's 22 substations remained in service the day after landfall. (Seventeen substations down is substation-level damage, not just downed lines — it's why restoration took days instead of hours.)
• Two days after landfall, Governor Kay Ivey reported 103,000 customers still without power across Baldwin County.
• Five days after landfall, Baldwin EMC had restored about 60,000 meters — and 18,197 meters were still dark.
• The physical damage behind those numbers: over 2,000 broken poles and 4,300 trees on power lines in the co-op's territory alone.

Sources: Hurricane Sally — Wikipedia (compiled from NHC and Baldwin EMC reports); Alabama Living — "Alabama co-ops mobilize to respond to Hurricane Sally" (the co-op's own damage tally: ~78,000 meters out at the peak).

Hurricane Ivan — September 16, 2004

Sixteen years to the day before Sally, Ivan made landfall near Gulf Shores in the early morning of September 16, 2004, as a Category 3 hurricane with winds around 120–130 mph and a storm surge estimated at 10–16 feet. Ivan was a bigger wind event than Sally: Alabama Power recorded about 825,000 outages statewide — the most in the company's history — and coastal Baldwin County spent years rebuilding homes, condos, and infrastructure. Older residents plan around Ivan the way the rest of the country plans around a once-a-generation storm; Sally proved the interval can be much shorter than a generation.

Sources: NOAA/NCEI Storm Events Database — Hurricane Ivan; Alabama Power's Powergrams retrospective on Ivan (825,000 outages).

Three Utilities, Three Different Storm Experiences

Baldwin County has no single power company. Whose lines feed your home decides which outage map you watch — and how big the system is that's trying to fix your problem:

Provider	What it is	Where you'll find it
Baldwin EMC	A member-owned electric cooperative (organized 1937) and Alabama's largest co-op, supplying more than 95,000 meters. Members are owners; storm restoration is done by local crews plus mutual-aid crews from other co-ops.	Most of Baldwin County, including much of Gulf Shores and Orange Beach, the rural areas, and southern Monroe County.
Riviera Utilities	The municipal utilities board of the City of Foley — a public, city-owned utility founded in 1916. It provides electric service to about 55,000 customers in 12 municipalities, plus natural gas, water, and wastewater service in and around Foley.	From Spanish Fort and Daphne through Foley and Loxley to Perdido Beach — including Fairhope, Silverhill, Summerdale, Elberta, and Bon Secour.
Alabama Power	The state's large investor-owned utility (a Southern Company subsidiary), regulated by the Alabama Public Service Commission, with statewide storm-restoration resources.	Portions of Baldwin County, including much of Orange Beach and scattered areas the co-op and Riviera don't serve.

Sources: Baldwin EMC — About; Riviera Utilities (electric service: 12 municipalities, Spanish Fort to Perdido Beach). Territory boundaries are street-specific — your bill is the authority on who serves your home.

What "Restoration Priority" Actually Means for Your House

After a major storm, every utility restores in roughly the same order — Alabama Power describes its own process as fixing first what restores the most customers and protects public safety. In practice:

• Substations and transmission first. Nothing downstream matters until these are alive — remember Sally left 17 of Baldwin EMC's 22 substations without power.
• Critical facilities and big feeders next. Hospitals, 911 and water/wastewater systems, then the lines serving the most customers per repair.
• Individual streets and single homes last. A snapped pole on a quiet street with six houses can wait days after the neighborhoods around it are back — not because anyone forgot, but because the math of restoration puts it at the end of the queue.

That's the honest case for a standby generator in Baldwin County: the design scenario isn't a two-hour outage. It's two to five days without power, in September heat, with a refrigerator full of food, a well that won't pump, or a beach house full of guests. Size and fuel decisions should start from that scenario — see the runtime math in the cost guide and estimate your loads with the sizing calculator.

Last updated: October 2026.