UPDATE 3 p.m.
Some customers who lost electricity in Thursday night's storms might not have their power restored until Tuesday, Entergy said.
The electric company said on Twitter that most of its Arkansas customers would have their service returned by Sunday but that Arkadelphia, Hot Springs and Pulaski County were expected to all have power back by Tuesday.
As of 2:20 p.m. Friday, 66,664 Entergy customers were still without service. That was down from 137,000 people without power after the storms rolled through.
[GALLERY: Click here for photos of storm damage in Little Rock and North Little Rock]
Sally Graham, a spokesman for Entergy, said crews spent Friday morning and early afternoon assessing the damage and building models for when customers could expect to have their power restored.
She said that 1,200 additional workers, mostly from the Entergy companies in Louisiana and Texas, will help 800 Entergy Arkansas workers with the restoration.
With a combined 67,000 outages between them Thursday night, Garland and Pulaski County were the hardest hit by Thursday’s storms, Graham said.
She noted that much of that service had already been restored. About 10,000 people without power in Garland County Friday afternoon while 23,000 remained in the dark in Pulaski County.
Graham said some customers in Arkadelphia, Pulaski County and Hot Springs will have their power restored before Tuesday as crews focus on the areas where they can get the most customers restored the quickest. Isolated homes and areas without power will be lower priorities, Graham said.
“We do anticipate that we will be continuing to work there until Tuesday for some of those customers,” she said
Entergy’s models, Graham said, predicted most customers would have their power back on by Sunday.
The City of Little Rock will open cooling centers for those without power — and therefore air conditioning — on Saturday and Sunday. The Dunbar Community Center at 1001 West 16th St. and Southwest Community Center at 6401 Baseline Road will be open from 8 a.m.–8 p.m. on Saturday and from noon to 7 p.m. on Sunday.
The Red Cross will also open a cooling center at Church of Christ at 948 Airport Road in Hot Springs on Saturday and Sunday from noon to 7 p.m.
— Austin Cannon
UPDATE 11:55 a.m.
Nearly 80,000 Entergy customers remained in the dark shortly before noon Friday and the utility warned that some outages would take days to repair.
Entergy said in a statement that service restoration "could take several days to complete in the hardest hit areas."
Damage was reported in a wide swath of the state, including Little Rock and North Little Rock.
As of Friday morning, the Little Rock Fire Department has made nearly 250 fire runs in the city since Thursday’s storms, according to Capt. Jacob-Lear Sadowsky.
That number is much lower than the average 86 calls made to the fire department on a day without severe weather spurring calls to concerns such as downed trees and building fires, Lear-Sadowsky, a fire department spokesman, said.
Additional information regarding the specific time frame of the calls as well as the nature of the reports was not immediately available.
Shortly before noon, 79,150 Entergy customers remained without power across Arkansas, according to the company’s outage map.
North Little Rock Electric said in an 11 a.m. statement that 1,114 of its customers remained without power.
Entergy spokesman Sally Graham was not immediately available by phone shortly before noon for an update on the “multi-day effort” to restore power.
Thursday’s storms have forced a number of closures in central Arkansas, including a portion of the Arkansas River Trail.
Just north of the Arkansas River, the Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum in North Little Rock will remain closed all day Friday because of power outages, according to a tweet.
— Brandon Riddle and John Moritz
UPDATE 10:40 a.m.
More than 81,000 Arkansans remained without power as of 10:40 a.m. as crews worked to restore service, according to Entergy’s outage map.
Of that total, more than 27,000 customers were in the dark in Pulaski County and nearly 11,000 were without power in Garland County.
The Little Rock Zoo said it was is closed until noon as officials work to clear tree limbs and fallen trees left after strong storms moved through Arkansas’ capital city Thursday.
In a statement, the zoo said all animals and staff are safe.
The Murray Dog Park at 5900 Rebsamen Park Road is also closed until further notice, the city of Little Rock said in a statement.
— Brandon Riddle
UPDATE 9:45 a.m.
Numerous fallen trees around Little Rock caused damage to power lines, parked cars and homes after storms with powerful gusting winds blew through central Arkansas Thursday evening.
Part of a house was damaged in the 1400 block of Summit Street when a large oak tree in the driveway was uprooted and fell through a room.
A neighbor inspecting his roof next door said the homeowners are doing OK Friday morning.
Across the street, the top half of another tree snapped in half, landing between two homes and causing some roof damage.
A car wash on Broadway Street near downtown Little Rock, meanwhile, was damaged when pieces of metal roofing were ripped off and strewn throughout the property.
At least a dozen roads south of Interstate 630 were closed off or partially blocked by downed trees and power lines.
According to the power company Entergy, about 85,000 customers remained in the dark in Arkansas as of 9:45 a.m.
— John Moritz
EARLIER
More than 87,000 people remained without power at daybreak Friday in Arkansas, down from a peak of around 137,000 Thursday night after gusting winds toppled trees and power lines throughout the state.
No injuries had been reported as of Friday morning. There were numerous reports of trees and power lines blown down or damaged by the winds, and some people took to social media posting photos of smashed cars or damaged houses.
A tornado warning was issued shortly after 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, abruptly ending a leadership ceremony at Central High School attended by former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, as well as former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
There were no reports of tornadoes touching down, said National Weather Service meteorologist Joe Goudsward, though there were several reported sightings of funnel clouds.
Entergy Arkansas' equipment was damaged in 41 counties, a spokesman for the utility company said Friday, calling the process to restore power in the hardest hit areas "a multi-day effort."
Those areas include Pulaski County, where more than 30,000 remained without power. Another 10,000 people were without power in Garland County and more than 6,000 were in the dark in Jefferson County.
Crews of scouts, tree-trimmers and linesman will began working 16-hour days to repair damaged lines and equipment, Entergy spokesman Sally Graham said. Additional crews from out-of-state utility companies have also been requested.
Additional storms rolling through the state Friday were unlikely to be as severe, meteorologists said, but they could delay power restoration because crews can't work in thunderstorms.
Goudsward said the system stretching from Jacksonville to Fayetteville could produce minor storms as it move across the state Friday morning. Another band of storms will move in around 3 p.m., he said.
According to the National Weather Service, the highest winds measured in the state Thursday were gusts of 67 mph at Little Rock's Clinton National Airport. The airport halted all flights for about an hour during the storm.
— John Moritz