What was up in Shelton this year?
It was bizarre enough when a tornado touched down in the Pine Rock section of Shelton in July, tearing trees out of the ground and crushing cars.
But less than six months later Shelton was hit twice more when an ice storm caused a 50-car pile-up and a mudslide almost made a house topple off a cliff.
Even the town’s emergency practice dummy drowned in the Housatonic River.
“This week and this year has been very challenging,” said Fire Chief Francis Jones the week of the mudslide and the ice storm.
There were no major injuries in any of the incidents, but each one caused its own form of property damage.
Emergency responders later reflected on the incidents, saying the emergencies helped crews practice responding together, and justified some equipment purchases.
Tornado
On July 31, a funnel cloud touched down in Shelton near the Stratford border, and 95 to 100 mile-per-hour winds tore up neighborhoods in the area.
The tornado had a path of about a half-mile, according to the Weather Service.
Surprisingly, no one was injured.
“It was a little chaotic, but the response was pulled together nicely,” said Assistant Fire Chief Nick Verdicchio.
For the next couple of days, neighbors cleared debris, straightened fences and filed insurance claims for damaged property.
Ice Storm
After a mid-afternoon ice storm slicked up roads throughout the Valley on Dec. 13, one spin-out on Route 110 in Shelton started a chain reaction accident that ended with 50 cars damaged, and 62 people treated by EMS personnel.
The cars kept sliding down the hill, north of the entrance to Indian Wells State Park, into a pile of twisted metal.
Six people were taken to the hospital, but no one had serious injuries in the crash.
The story was picked up by national news outlets because it was so out of the ordinary.
Mudslide
Police were still tallying the damage from the pile-up when a massive mudslide happened two days later.
A 104-year-old home on North Oak Avenue was left teetering on the edge of a cliff when the ground slid out from underneath it. Officials at the scene said the mudslide was likely caused by a frozen pipe bursting and saturating the ground. The old home had a dirt-floor basement, which eventually just disappeared.
But neighbors had been complaining that the end of the street was eroding for years, and were worried about the house falling long before the mudslide.
The home was being foreclosed on when the mudslide happened, creating a sticky grey area of ownership that delayed demolition of the home while officials tried to figure out who would pay for it.
By Dec. 18, the city ended up taking down the home, but left the rubble for the responsible party – whoever that turns out to be – to clean up .
No one was hurt.
