Date: Fri 30-Aug-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: KAAREN

Quick Words:

weather-storm-Sandy-Hook

Full Text:

w/photos: Storm Brings Down Wire And Trees In Sandy Hook

A late season storm swept through Newtown shortly after 9 am last Saturday,

knocking trees and limbs onto wires and onto a house on Pine Street in Sandy

Hook.

No one was injured in the storm. The rain was at its heaviest during The Bee's

annual 10K Road Race (see related story).

Newtown escaped most of the storm's fury. But the torrential rain that fell

throughout Fairfield County Friday night knocked out power to large areas of

Danbury and Monroe. At its peak, about 1,455 customers were without power in

neighborhoods off Berkshire Road in Sandy Hook.

Locally most of the storm damage was in Sandy Hook where firefighters from

Sandy Hook Volunteer Fire and Rescue Company spent Saturday morning and part

of the afternoon at sites where trees or limbs fell.

At 9:20 am, firefighters were called to Bennetts Bridge Road, where a tree had

fallen onto wires closing the road for several hours. At 9:35 am, firefighters

responded to a similar incident on Jeremiah Road. Because the wires there were

sparking, firefighters requested that a CL&P crew come to make the scene safe

and restore power. The CL&P crew didn't arrive until about 2 pm, according to

a report filed by firefighters at the emergency dispatch center in Edmond Town

Hall.

At 9:45 am, wires were reported down on Homer Clark Lane. Three minutes later,

the call came in to the 911 dispatch center in Edmond Town Hall that a tree

had fallen onto a house at 3 Pine Street. Wires also were reported down

shortly after noon on Grand Place, where 28 homes were without power briefly.

"Mostly there were very small pockets of problems around the town," said Margo

Jackson-Douglas, a CL&P spokesperson. "Because it was a weekend, there were

fewer crews on and they were focused on the areas where there were major

problems, such as Monroe. Our first effort is to make areas safe, then restore

the power."