North Carolina power still dark for nearly 35k customers, Mayorkas addresses 'attack' on infrastructure

Nearly 35,000 Moore County, North Carolina residents are still without power after vandals used firearms to take out two substations on Sunday.

The incident is being investigated by federal, local and state agencies, and many leaders are declaring it as a deliberate attack.

"Some infrastructure was attacked," U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said on Monday. "It appears to have been deliberate."

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Mayorkas delivered a keynote address at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on Monday afternoon, where he spoke about cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure and the convergence of National Security and Homeland Security.

After giving his speech that focused on how the roles of both agencies overlap and become blurred, Vivian Salama from The Wall Street Journal asked the secretary several questions, including one on recent attacks on infrastructure.

Mayorkas acknowledged the attack on the power grid, providing an update on the investigation.

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"We are working with energy companies and local communities to address the situation, impacting the power that reaches homes in the targeted neighborhoods," he said. "This is one where the investigators, federal and local, are working very hand-in-glove with the remediators, the private sector, the local communities to bring a wholistic array of tools…to address the situation, to remediate it, to learn from it, to communicate to others so that we become more resilient and prevent the next one from occurring."

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On Monday, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper met with local, state and federal law enforcement, as well as Duke Energy officials in Moore County, to discuss the power outage.

"An attack like this on critical infrastructure is a serious, intentional crime and I expect state and federal authorities to thoroughly investigate and bring those responsible to justice," Gov. Cooper said on Twitter on Sunday.

Moore County Sheriff Ronnie Fields said on Sunday that extensive damage was found at two substations, caused by multiple gunshots. As a result, power outages occurred throughout the county, leaving over 45,000 customers without electricity.

On Monday, poweroutage.us reported 34,359 customers were still without power.

Duke Electric said power may not be restored completely until Thursday.

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Rumors surrounding the substation attacks made the rounds online, suggesting they were taken out as an effort to stop a drag show from taking place in Moore County.

One person of interest turned to social media and said she knew how the power outage occurred. Fields said on Sunday the person was interviewed by law enforcement officials, and the information she provided was debunked.