(WTXL) - Residents of one of the hardest hit cities returned home for the first time Wednesday.
When the Category 4 Hurricane hit Mexico Beach, it took out most of all business and homes along the coast line.
Recovery teams are still on the beach and throughout the city -- searching for any signs of hope in the thousands of pounds of rubble and broken homes.
As of Wednesday, state emergency officials say some roughly 124,000 customers across the Panhandle were still without power, and 1-thousand, 157 remained in shelters.
Mayor Al Cathey of Mexico Beach: "I've lived here sixty five years, and when I went out of my house on Wednesday afternoon at 4:00. And I live on the far east end of town but I remember when I when no, When I saw what was around me I just went to my knees and I thought, do we have anything or is there, you know, do we have anything here?"
Signs of normalcy are slowly coming to place now that cell phone service has started to return to the area.
