< p>BOSTON (AP) — The number of Massachusetts residents still in the dark after Monday's storm continues to drop and state officials are crediting utilities with an improved response compared with that after two major storms last year.

About 46,000 customers were without power Wednesday evening, down from approximately 400,000 at the height of the storm.

National Grid was reporting about 33,000 remaining outages; NStar had about 13,000 and Western Massachusetts Electric Co. was down to about 135.

National Grid had restored 73 percent of its customers within about 36 hours of peak outages from Sandy, compared with 57 percent after Tropical Storm Irene and 45 percent after the surprise October snowstorm.

NStar had 82 percent of customers back within a day and a half of Sandy's peak, compared with 66 percent after Irene and 71 percent after the October snowstorm.