WISCONSIN (CBS 58) -- The Red Cross opened a warming center Friday evening at Rose Park in Milwaukee because so many people are still without power.

The heavy snow took out tree branches knocking out nearby power lines.

We went to some of the most impacted neighborhoods and found some pretty precarious situations.

Tony Rivera's family had to get his sick 86-year-old grandmother to a safe place. Rivera said, "She was crying around noon, saying it was too cold because the power had been off since yesterday night."

Their house was the coldest we found Friday, 45 degrees inside.

Rivera and his Grover Heights neighbors lost power at about 2 a.m. It was too cold to sleep; they'd been awake all night.

They finally shuttled his grandmother to his aunt's house, but then she lost power, too.

Thousands of people were in the same boat.

According to the We Energies outage map, more than 130,000 people were without power at the height of the outages.

Sy Smith, of the 5 Points Neighborhood Association, said, "Our main concern is basically making sure the seniors and those who have oxygen needs are being met right away."

The association tried to check on the most vulnerable but could not tell them when things would get better.

The outages had peaked at more than 130,000 by midmorning. By midafternoon, We Energies had restored power to tens of thousands of customers.

But that still left many more in the dark and cold, and they were frustrated with a lack of answers.

Smith said, "Everything goes right to 'We know there's an outage, and they hang up on you after that."

Rivera said he would call and then "Just wait for hours and hours with no response."

And David Rodriguez said he got "Nothing. Not a thing."

We found Rodriguez sitting in his car. He told us, "It's too cold in the house, 61 degrees. It's very cold in the house."

David also requires a CPAP machine to sleep, but without power the machine stopped working. He said, "I got up at probably 5:00. And I couldn't breathe."

David was going to give it another hour before looking for a motel.

Elsewhere, Tracy Minger was helping his 94-year-old mother stick it out. He said they were "Holding up, but it's cold. Gotta be under the blankets. There's no heat, been out since about 3:00 in the morning, my mom said."

We Energies expects 90% of the outages will be restored by the end of Friday night, and 98% by the end of the day Saturday.

But that remaining 2% translates to more than 2,500 people who will have been without power for about two days.

"We've called for additional help from throughout the state, with neighboring utilities, and they're sending contractors down to help us out," said Jeb Loth, senior operations supervisor with We Energies.

Loth went on to say crews in the field are fighting Mother Nature.

"The weather conditions, the wet, heavy snow is causing a lot of problems. Weight on trees, weight on wire, weight on equipment, that’s the biggest problem."

The downed lines are pulling critical electrical equipment from people's homes.

"They told us we got to call the electrician to come out and do it," said Charles Windham, a We Energies customer.

The service unit that supplies power to Windham's house was ripped from his home, a repair out of We Energies' control.

"I thought it was something they do, but they say they don’t, so I got to figure out some type of way to get it fixed," said Windham.

The repair will likely set him back hundreds of dollars.

Meanwhile, We Energies said they are working as fast as possible to restore all their customers' power.

"We will be staffed 24/7, until the last customer is restored," said Loth.

To report an outage, click here, call 800-662-4797 or use the We Energies app.

Heavy snow buildup on trees has caused significant power outages.

Hundreds of crews from across the state are working on restoration efforts.

Report your outage:
- We Energies app: https://t.co/hmDBwt6xX9
- Online: https://t.co/6zzyTAjordpic.twitter.com/YViUGePr5X

— We Energies (@we_energies) March 10, 2023