ST. LOUIS — Multiple rounds of severe storms are on their way to the St. Louis area, with meteorologists expecting the first system to hit the area around lunchtime.
The news is worrying for the hundreds still without power after Tuesday's early morning storms. Ameren estimated that nearly 1,000 people were still without power in the St. Louis and Metro East region as of 8 a.m. Wednesday morning.
The utility company told 5 On Your Side dozens of dispatchers will use smart devices located in people's homes and businesses to monitor power outages as the storms roll in.
Outage data that Ameren compiles is available to everyone through the company outage map. Track the latest power outage updates on the map below:
When an outage occurs, Ameren said it takes an average of 3 hours to turn the power back on.
"What we're trying to do is understand where those outages may be," said Ben Lynch, director of Distribution operations at Ameren Missouri.
"We're looking to repair those outages as quickly as possible. We also are consistently looking through areas that may have had a historical, maybe multiple outages over the previous year, we're definitely looking to drive future projects so we can remedy those issues before they become a problem again, for our customers."
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