[8/3/03]When Jerry Melton finished cutting his lawn Saturday afternoon, he expected the air inside his 200 East Pecan Tree Lane house to cool him off.

However, the power was off at his and about 2,400 other people’s homes throughout Vicksburg and Warren County.

“The first thing I noticed was the house was kind of warm, ” Melton said.

Residents in the Openwood subdivision, parts of Bovina, along U.S. Highway 80, Silver Creek subdivision, and areas along Cherry and Clay Streets in Vicksburg experienced power outages, said Entergy spokesman Cheryl Comans said.

Entergy received its first calls of people without power at about 2:30 p.m., she said.

At 9:30 p.m., less than 25 customers were still without power but were expected to have it back on by 11 p.m. Saturday.

Comans said the storm that passed through the area between Vicksburg and Clinton was to blame for the blackout.

Melton’s house in Openwood subdivision had its power restored around 7 p.m. He said he took the power outage as an excuse to drive into town and eat dinner.

“I didn’t want to open my refrigerator because I didn’t know how long the power was going to be out,” he said.