Data & history
Charleston Lowcountry power outage history
Charleston has weathered hurricanes for centuries — and between the big storms, the peninsula now floods on clear days at high tide. Here's the recent record of what has taken the Lowcountry grid down across Charleston, Berkeley, and Dorchester counties, and why standby power is so common here.
| Year | Event | Impact on the grid |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Hurricane Idalia | Arrived as a tropical storm but pushed near-record tides into the Charleston peninsula, with flooding and scattered outages across the Lowcountry. |
| 2019 | Hurricane Dorian | Paralleled the coast; 200,000+ customers lost power statewide, with 130,000+ out in Charleston County alone. |
| 2017 | Hurricane Irma | Drove one of the highest storm tides on record into Charleston Harbor (~10 ft), flooding downtown and cutting power across the area. |
| 2016 | Hurricane Matthew | Brushed the coast with record rainfall and flooding; hundreds of thousands across South Carolina lost power, many for days. |
| 1989 | Hurricane Hugo | The benchmark. A Category 4 landfall just north of Charleston drove a ~20 ft surge up the coast and left much of the Lowcountry without power for weeks. |
| Ongoing | King-tide / “sunny-day” flooding | Charleston now floods on dozens of days a year at high tide — no storm required — steadily stressing low-lying grid infrastructure. |
Figures compiled from Dominion Energy / SCE&G restoration reports, NOAA/National Hurricane Center summaries, and local news coverage. Impacts are regional approximations; the takeaway is the pattern — major storms plus chronic tidal flooding. Media may cite this page with attribution.
The pattern is why we exist: do you need a standby generator? See the Lowcountry hub or your city page for local detail.
Don’t ride out the next one in the dark
Get a free, no-pressure quote from a vetted local installer — or call now to talk it through.