PLATTSBURGH -- The remnants of Hurricane Ike blasted the North Country early Monday, toppling trees and causing power outages.

As of 11:30 a.m. Monday, about 2,300 New York State Electric & Gas customers remained without power, down from a peak of about 5,000 customers.

The heaviest concentration of NYSEG outages were in the towns of Bellmont, Chesterfield, Dannemora, Ellenburg, Long Lake, Peru and Plattsburgh.

At 1 p.m., National Grid had 1,062 customers out in Franklin County, 870 in Essex County and 81 in Clinton County.

In Franklin, most of the National Grid outages were in the Town of Brighton; in Essex County, the problem spots were Crown Point and Schroon; in Clinton County, Black Brook.

National Grid predicted most customers would have power by late Monday.

NYSEG crews expected to have all the customers back online by midnight.

"The high winds resulted in numerous downed wires," Mark Leta, NYSEG's regional operations manager, said in a news release.

But he cited "a quick response from our crews" in getting power back on.

To ensure safety as the restoration effort continues, any downed or low-hanging wires should be assumed to be "energized."

People must stay away from any problem wires and keep others away as well to ensure their safety, Leta said.

MLD BUSY

Several big trees were knocked down, which damaged power-service boxes at some residences and tore down power lines.

The biggest problem happened shortly after that, when a large tree fell on power lines between Kennedy and Erin avenues in the West End. Power had to be shut off on those two streets for about two hours as MLD crews made repairs.

A large tree also came down at the corner of Broad Street and Sanborn Avenue. MLD crews cut up and removed that tree.