461K DTE customers remain without power, with estimated restoration of Sunday for many

FOX 2 (WJBK) - It’s day two of power outages after a historic winter ice storm from frozen southeast Michigan. Early Friday morning, there was still 461,376 DTE Energy customers without electricity.

DTE says its storm response team will be in the field until all customers are restored. Most customers won’t be back up and running until Sunday. 

School closings: Numerous districts are closed for Friday, Feb. 24. See the list here. 

"We have additional crews coming in for restoration," said Trevor Lauer. "The weather is turning in (our) favor. It is getting colder this weekend but it's going to be good weather to restore customers. We have a big team going and DTE and the rest of the utilities in the state are working actively on that."

Jaye Jackson and Gregory Lane, have had enough. The two grabbed a pair of the last generators at the Lowe’s hardware store in Southfield Thursday.

"I've been through too many winters of suffering, losing food, being cold, gotta go to a hotel, calling friends," said Lane. "It's just too much."

CLICK HERE for the DTE Outage Map.

Joe Sanfilippo was buying a propane heater. He just wants to keep his water supply from freezing.

FOX 2: What happens when your well freezes?"

Oh boy, first of all, big money," he said. "They have to dig it up because it's 50 feet down and it costs a lot of money to do. And you need water for everything.

"So it's imperative that I get heat under the house tonight, and make sure that it stays above freezing."

The outages mounted by the minute Wednesday and Thursday. Stop signs have now been placed through powerless intersections.

Related: Warren man watches garage burn from downed wire as DTE takes 6 hours to respond

Businesses without backup power are closed - and when night falls entire neighborhoods are plunged into darkness.

"I just hope everyone is fortunate enough to stay warm and not be freezing tonight, even if they’re in a home," said Tracy Kielb.

Tracy and Tim Kielb are just two of thousands without power in Livonia. The recreation center there is doubling as warming center in light of it.

"I really appreciate they have it open for not just showers, but they offered cots," said Edward McCall. "They are really stepping up for the community."

Bennie Elementary School is the only building in the Allen Park school district that has power right now. It is being used as a warming station for residents.

"We decided we wanted to stay warm," said Pat Schuman. "We went to the YMCA and walked around their track. We did about a half-mile and then their power went out. So they closed that."

More: Michigan football's Jim Harbaugh helps police clear fallen tree in ice storm

Robin Partrich, the building engineer for Allen Park Schools, helped come up with the idea.

"We're not looking at getting our power restored until probably Sunday," she said. "I texted the superintendent and said we need to do the right thing here and open our building up for a warming center."

See a downed line? Assume every line is active and live, and stay 25 feet away. Report it to DTE HERE.