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.

A falling limb knocked the service box off the side of a house at 30 Grace Ave. shortly before 6 a.m. At around the same time, a tree fell on 86-88 Broad St., damaging the service box and roof.

"We were all back up and running between 9:30 a.m. and 10 a.m.," MLD Manager William Treacy said.

SKATED AROUND'

National Weather Service observer Dave Werner of Malone said the highest unofficial wind velocity he recorded was 52 mph from the southwest.

"It looks like it pretty much skated around us," said Franklin County Deputy Emergency Services Director Ricky Provost. "We have scattered power out all over, and it looks like one township, Duane, is without phone service.

"But other than that, it looks pretty good."

He said that starting about 3 a.m. the Enhanced 911 dispatchers received about 25 calls about power lines down or limbs and trees that had fallen across utility wires.

But no major damage was reported, Provost said.

SCHOOL CLOSED

Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department responded to several calls of trees and power lines down, with one broken utility pole on Route 30 in Paul Smiths.

Other trees fell along Route 30 in sections of Lake Clear, on Muzzy Road in Vermontville and on River Road near the dam at Franklin Falls.

But otherwise, property damage due to wind was minimal, with continued power outages reported at 1:30 p.m. in Lake Clear.

Bloomingdale Elementary School was closed Monday due to early morning power outages.

Tupper Lake lost power for a few hours early Monday morning.