Living off the grid - this has been a crazy week! We wanted to recap some of today's storm recovery updates:
* Main Street is now open to traffic at Pound Street
* Power has now been restored from the Library to Parks and Rec.
* Stop and Shop is fully powered and restocking
* The Transfer Station is open
*The Aldrich welcomes visitors for free to view exhibits, cool off, charge their phones, and use the restrooms. The Museum does not have WiFi or Internet at this time.
* Potable water will be available after 3pm at:
- Parks & Rec
- Ridgefield Playhouse
- Ridgebury Fire House (169 Old Stagecoach Road)
*Please bring your own containers!
Eversource Updates
As of 1:45 p.m. Thursday, there are approximately 519,000 customers without service. Power has been restored to 347,061 customers since the storm began.
Eversource says that the impact from this storm, in terms of customers affected in Connecticut, is one of the largest on record. So far patrollers have identified:
- More than 500 broken poles
- More than 3,000 downed spans of electrical wire
- More than 2,200 trees to be removed
- More than 700 blocked roads
- More than 170 damaged transformers
Eversource tweeted today @EversourceCT "Hundreds of our line and tree crews, damage assessors, wire-down guards, as well as crews from Canada and across the U.S., are urgently working on clearing blocked roads and making repairs to the backbone of the electric system that feeds the local lines to our customers."
Eversource announced today that they will provide most residents an estimate of power restoration by the end of the day (that has not happened as of this post).
- If all of your neighbors have their power back on, but yours is still out, report your outage again by calling 800-286-2000.
- If you require emergency shelter, either because of damage to your home, the temperature or other reasons, please contact the American Red Cross online or by dialing 211.
- If you have to drive, watch out for trees and wires in the roadway. Do not drive across a downed power line. Treat all nonworking traffic lights as stop signs and proceed cautiously at intersections.
- Stay clear of all fallen tree limbs and electrical wires as well as anything they are touching—such as puddles and metal fences.
- Notify local fire, police, and electric utility officials about downed power lines.
- Do not enter damaged buildings with flame lanterns, candles or lighted cigarettes because there may be gas leaks.
- If you smell gas, leave immediately. Get to a safe place and call 911.
- Plug in and then turn on your appliances one at a time to avoid a power surge.
Follow Ridgefield Emergency Management on Facebook here.
Hang in there, Ridgefield.