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First the storm, now the cleanup

Thursday, January 19, 2006

(New York-WABC, January 19, 2006) (WABC) -- It's been a long night's work for utility crews in the tri-state area. More than 34,000 customers in Connecticut remain without electricity this morning after yesterday's storm downed trees and power lines.

Eyewitness news reporter Lisa Colagrossi is in Hastings-on-Hudson--but we begin with Ken Rosato who is live in Summit, New Jersey.

PSE&G is out in force trying to get the power back on as house after house sits dark after a windstorm snapped poles and left power lines in a tangled mess.

Joe Diore, Resident without Power: "...a big bang, I got up, I looked out, both trees were down--crushing a guy's house, crushing the fence, the pole was in half..no power."

Utility crews working straight through to clear the mess so that PSE&G could come in and untangle these high voltage lines.

Nearby, another neighborhood hangs in the balance, hoping a tree won't snap the lines and knock out power before clean up crews can make their way there.

Meanwhile, yet more homes are dark as high winds threaten yet to topple another utility pole, leaving crews to replace it with another before the lines are stretched too far.

Power outages as of 11:00 a.m:

On Long Island-- 1,002 customers are still without power.

In New Jersey-- the number of outages is down to 140.

In Connecticut -- 28,257 (2,683 in Greenwich, 1,114 in Stamford).

In NYC -- down to 0 customers.

In Westchester County -- 16,000 customers, Putnam -- 3,600 and Dutchess County -- 3,000.

Rockland -- 715 power outages.

Flood warnings are in effect this morning for people in low lying areas. Rain has left swollen creeks and rivers making it quite dangerous for these areas.

Now we'll take you over to Lisa Colagrossi who is live in Hastings-on-Hudson.

In Westchester, we have entire neighborhoods blacked out, schools shut down, and Con Ed crews worked to the bone. The problems that started with Saturday's ice storm have gotten much worse. Con Ed crews have been all night long trying to get the power back on.

Marlo Falcone, White Plains woman: (pointing outside her house) "There's a tree down over there, as you can see our tree we have no power, gas, heat, nothing, nothing."

Nothing indeed.

Con Ed crews this morning were working on a huge tree that fell across Broadway, the main drag going into Hastings-on-Hudson. That tree knocked down power lines and the utility pole. The road was closed down until crews could clean the tree up.

Con Ed has hundreds of crews working to restore power across Westchester County. But there are problems everywhere -- hundreds of trees down, still tangled up with live power lines.

One Hartsdale neighborhood was cutoff by the large tree blocking their road. People had to walk in or out -- because the Con Ed cables stuck in the tree, were still hot.

In New Rochelle falling trees killed one man and seriously injured a police officer.

In Valhalla the railroad parking lot looked like a battleground. Cars, pickups and SUV's pummeled and flattened by falling trees.

Some people in Westchester have been without power -- since last weekend's ice storm.

For many of them no power means no heat.

But instead of just getting by,some people are adapting.

Woman without Power: "(laughing) Actually, it's nice to have a snow day without snow."

Of course, Connecticut remains the hardest hit part of the region thanks to this week's one-two punch from the weather.

It could be days before power is restored to some communities, such as Greenwich.

Governor Rell has put the state's national guard on standby in case towns and cities need extra help cleaning up debris.

Con Edison crews are working to restore power to two water pump stations in the Nodine Hill area of Yonkers. Residents citywide are asked to conserve water for the next 24 hours to prevent shortages in the event of a fire.

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