Weather-related wrecks that knocked down two utility poles caused almost 1,200 South Central Power Company customers to lose electric service Tuesday afternoon, spokesperson Lisa Hooker said.

Hooker said South Central Power crews were reporting lines down after phase three poles were damaged during separate accidents on SR 73 and SR 134 in Highland County.

Around 3:30 p.m. South Central reported that 1,180 of its 8,761 Highland County customers were without power. That number was down to 822 customers around 5 p.m. and 587 customers at 5:30 p.m.

Hooker said she did not have a time frame for when power for the other customers would be restored.

“The weather is really rotten and we’re expecting more outages tonight,” Hooker said. “The winds are going to gather, we’re expecting some drifting and the road conditions are going to make it tough on our guys, but they’re going to keep at it. We know it’s really cold for the people without power out there, too.”

She said the poles that were damaged carried a bigger load than a typical utility pole, so they were likely going to take a little longer to repair.

The Highland County Sheriff’s Office said it was investigating several accidents around 5 p.m. Tuesday, although most of them involved people sliding off the road without any injuries.

A spokesperson mentioned an accident on SR 73 south of Berrysville, a pickup truck off the road on the “S” curves on SR 135, and accidents on SR 72 north of Samantha and SR 73 near Diven Road.

Shortly thereafter scanner traffic reported on accident on Barger Road near SR 28 with a vehicle on its top. The traffic also said that all passengers were out of the vehicle without injuries.

“Once the sun goes down we’re going to get freezing temperatures and probably some black ice so I assume it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” the HCSO spokesperson said.

Reach Jeff Gilliland at 937-402-2522 or on Twitter @13gillilandj.