Intense thunderstorms involving lightning, thunder, high winds, and heavy rains hit Newtown hard overnight Wednesday into Thursday, resulting in power outages, many street closures, and widespread damage to utility lines.but later canceled school when the extent of the storm damage became clear.

School officials initially decided to delay the start of school on February 25 by two hours,

Between 5:05 pm on Wednesday and 6:39 am on Thursday, town volunteer fire companies responded to 30 reports of wires down. Hook & Ladder went to 15 calls, Dodgingtown and Sandy Hook each responded to six calls, and Hawleyville went to three calls.

As of 10:38 am on Thursday, 915 Eversource customers in Newtown were without electric service, representing about eight percent of the firm's 11,070 local customers.

Eversource spokesman Mitch Gross said that as of about 8:20 am about 72,000 of Eversource's 1.25 million customers statewide were without electric service.

The extensive damage statewide caused by the storms resulted from very high winds, intense rain, and lightning strikes, he said.

Asked what parts of the state were hardest hit by the storms, he responded, "Everywhere, everywhere."

One case of a fallen tree hitting power lines had a heavy impact on motorists. An evergreen fell onto Mt Pleasant Road (US Route 6/State Route 25), just east of its intersection with Diamond Drive. The situation stopped through-traffic on Mt Pleasant Road from about 10:40 pm on Wednesday to 9:30 am on Thursday.

During the road blockage, traffic was detoured onto Blackman Road, Tunnel Road, and Currituck Road to avoid the affected area, said police Sergeant Jeff Silver.

The fallen tree across Mt Pleasant Road had a major traffic impact, when considering the volume of traffic that uses Mt Pleasant Road during the morning rush.

Sgt Silver said he knew of no injuries occurring locally due to the storm.

The town highway department was working overnight in an effort to get obstructed roads cleared, he said.

The storm caused some localized road flooding due to blocked storm drains, he said.

Town Public Works Director Fred Hurley said at about 10:30 am on Thursday that about eight road sections were still closed due to fallen trees that had become entangled with utility lines, requiring that town crews wait until Eversource could neutralize the fallen power lines before clearing the obstructions.

After it became clear that about 30 percent of local school bus routes would be affected by road blockages, the decision to cancel school was made, Mr Hurley said.

According to information listed provided by town officials, the storm caused partial or full road closures on Boggs Hill Road, Bradley Lane between Country Squire and Nutmeg Lane, Bonnie Brae Drive, Castle Hill Road near Head O' Meadow Road, Cross Brook Road, Deep Brook Road between Brushy Hill Road and Point O' Rocks Road, Great Ring Road, Hitfield Road, Head O' Meadow Road near Shepard Hill Road, Mountain Laurel Lane, Old Hawleyville Road, Parmalee Hill Road, Plumtrees Road, Poverty Hollow Road at Morris Road, Queen Street, Russet Road, Schoolhouse Hill Road near Edmond Road, and Scudder Road, among other roads.