Nearly 129,000 area customers remained without power yesterday after violent winds wreaked havoc on trees and power lines, and officials say it could be tomorrow or even Thursday before all power is restored.

One death was reported as a result of Sunday night's winds. An Oil City man was killed when the powerful winds snapped off a branch from a tree and it struck his head, according to the Venango County coroner.

Brendan Beck, 46, of Rich Street, was helping his father-in-law remove a tree branch from a roof when he was hit by another branch shortly before 10 p.m. Mr. Beck suffered severe head trauma and died at the scene.

Falling limbs and trees, as well as toppled utility poles, also were responsible for widespread power outages. Crews were working through the night, and some power companies were calling in additional help from outside the region.

Among the most affected communities were Bellevue, Hampton, McCandless, Richland and Ross in Allegheny County; Brighton, Hopewell and New Brighton in Beaver County; Canonsburg and Avella in Washington County; Apollo and New Kensington in Westmoreland County; and Butler and Cranberry in Butler County.

Allegheny Power said its customers in Allegheny, Armstrong, Butler, Westmoreland and Washington counties should have their power completely back by tomorrow night. Penn Power, which primarily serves Butler, Lawrence and Mercer counties, expected full service by Thursday.

Duquesne Light Co., which serves Allegheny and Beaver counties, did not offer any estimates on restoring service.

As he did after weekend storms in June that knocked out power to thousands of households, Allegheny County Councilman Matt Drozd urged the state Public Utility Commission and council's safety committee to investigate the frequency of Duquesne Light power outages.

Mr. Drozd said the company did not fix problems it said it would address after its officials met with council following the June storms.

He said the company promised to beef up its call center, but when he called repeatedly Sunday night from his house in Ross he couldn't get a live person on the line. The company changed its answering machine message, he said, but nothing else.

"They said they would correct it," he said yesterday at a news conference he arranged. "They didn't, evidently."

He said the county 911 center was swamped by calls from people who couldn't get an answer from Duquesne Light beyond a recording. Because the 911 center received so many calls that Duquesne Light should have fielded, he said, the utility company "put people at risk."

He did acknowledge, however, that many of those people shouldn't have been calling 911 because they didn't have a true emergency.

Mr. Drozd also criticized the utility company for sending 15 workers to help clean up storm damage in Texas when he said they were needed at home. He said it shouldn't send any crews farther away than a two-hour trip so they can get back here fast.

Joseph Vallarian, spokesman for Duquesne Light, said Mr. Drozd has often criticized the utility company after storms but has refused to visit its facilities to see how things work despite repeated offers.

Mr. Vallarian said company officials have met twice with County Council -- in August 2007 and again this summer -- and both times presented figures from the PUC indicating that Duquesne Light's reliability numbers are among the best in the state among power companies.

He also said employees were added to the call center even before the most recent meeting. And he pointed out that the 15 workers sent to the Texas coast, who were on their way back to Pittsburgh yesterday, are a tiny percentage of the company's 1,200 employees.

He said it just takes time to fix downed power lines after such an intense storm.

"The issue that we're facing is that we had hurricane-force winds blow through Allegheny and Beaver counties," he said. "When that happens, obviously there's going to be a lot of damage out there. We understand that people are frustrated. We are, too."

The outages, though widespread, were spotty. In some neighborhoods, homes without power were a block away from unaffected neighbors.

Power company officials said that's because in cases like these, when individual transformers and power lines are felled, the grid has the ability to reroute power and isolate a small area. The grid is compartmentalized in circuits or fuses that each control a small area.

When power in a nearby area is knocked out, sometimes lights will flicker or a brief outage occur as a power substation automatically switches circuits to avoid the severed line.

Crews were working through the night not only to repair circuits, but also to clear debris. Several state roads remained closed yesterday in Allegheny, Beaver and Lawrence counties because of downed power lines and other damage.

Some areas lost water service, as well, when power was lost at pumping stations. Lawrence County residents without potable water can obtain it at their local fire station, according to a news release from the county's department of public safety.

There were numerous school closings and delays in the area yesterday. The Pittsburgh Public Schools called a two-hour delay about 50 minutes later than it usually does for weather emergencies, inconveniencing some parents.

District spokeswoman Ebony Pugh said most weather delays are announced at 5:30 a.m., while yesterday's was announced at 6:20 a.m. She said officials didn't know about the need for a delay until custodians reporting to work at 6 a.m. discovered power outages in some buildings.

The district later canceled classes at 14 buildings because power never came back on. Ms. Pugh said she expects all schools to operate on a regular schedule today.

Some school districts reported that they expected to remain closed, or that some schools would not have classes today. Among the districts were Avonworth in Allegheny County; Allegheny-Clarion Valley in Clarion County; and Freedom Area and Western Beaver in Beaver County. Schools included Penn Hills Senior High in the Penn Hills district and Wilkins Primary in the Woodland Hills School District, both in Allegheny County.