Update: As of 4:30 p.m., Oxford emergency officials were in the process of closing the emergency shelter at Oxford High School and moving the operation to the Quaker Farms School at 30 Great Oak Road.
The new shelter is scheduled to open at 6 p.m. Updated Oxford shelter info here.
The switch is being made because one of the boilers in the school overheated. The boiler’s release system didn’t function properly, which triggered a large steam release inside the school.
At about 3:30 p.m., Oxford and Seymour firefighters were sent to the school after receiving a report of a fire inside the school. Firefighters quickly realized it was a boiler problem.
They vented the building, then Fire Department Chief Scott Pelletier made the call to move the operation.
Long Day In The Valley
The high school issue capped a tough day in Oxford , where, at 11:07 a.m., 100 percent of Connecticut Light and Power customers were without power, according to the utility’s website.
At 11:29 a.m., the utility reported 100 percent of Seymour was out as well.
Oxford first opened its shelter at 12:30 p.m. and had three immediate takers.
CL&P was telling customers it could be a week before all customers in Connecticut are restored.
United Illuminating said they’d have all customers back online by Monday night.
State officials say call 211 for shelter information.
Seymour
Seymour announced that the middle school will be used for shelter and showers. There is no school in Seymour Monday. CLICK HERE for complete information on the Seymour shelter.
The Town of Seymour sent out a Code Red automatic phone message at about 12:15 p.m. saying 100 percent of CL&P customers were without electricity.
CL&P is working the issue, the message said, but restoration efforts will take some time because the utility is overwhelmed. It could take as much as five days to repair the problems.
Seymour reminded residents to be cautious of downed trees and wires.
Oxford
First Selectwoman Mary Ann Drayton-Rogers sent out an e-mail at about 11:40 a.m. saying Oxford schools will not open Monday.
CLICK HERE for more shelter info.
The message read, in part:
“Overnight accommodations will be provided to those without heat and power. Due to the large number of residents without power, if residents can seek shelter with family or friends that have power, that is also encouraged. If using the shelter please bring bedding and necessary medications with you.
We continue to urge residents to stay off local roads, to avoid coming in contact with power lines and downed trees with lines on them. Power outages are expected to last up to five days.
Oxford Schools will be closed on Monday and Trick or Trunk is canceled for Monday evening. The Oxford Town Hall will be open at 9 AM on Monday.”
In an e-mail to reporters and others earlier in the day, Drayton-Rogers said the town was still waiting for CL&P to start making repairs in town.
Shelton
Shelton used robocalls Saturday about 4:15 p.m. to tell residents UI was hoping to have 50 percent of its customers back online by this evening. As of 5 p.m., there were 2,263 UI customers in Shelton without power. The number for the emergency command center is 203-924-5941.
At about 12:30 p.m. Sunday, Shelton officials were evaluating whether to open a shelter, according to Office of Emergency Management Director John Millo.
The city was waiting to see if UI could restore most of the power before nightfall. The UI territory was not as hard hit as CL&P territory.
“UI is making great progress,” Millo said. “We’re still around 1,500 (without power), but we expect it to be much less by the end of the day.”
The emergency management office opened in City Hall to assess emergency needs, Millo said.
So far there have been no injuries associate with the storm in Shelton, Millo said.
The Outages At 12:35 p.m.
Ansonia: 636
Derby: 25
Oxford: 5266 (100 percent of CL&P customers)
Seymour: 7469 (100 percent)
Shelton: 1505
Malloy’s Sunday Updates
The honchos from the two utility companies repeated those statements at an 8:30 a.m. press conference Sunday with Gov. Dan Malloy at the state’s emergency operations center.
The utility heads were scheduled to appear again at 6 p.m. Sunday.
“This is a historic storm, never before in anyone’s recollection or anyone’s review of history has such a storm hit the state so early,” Malloy said early Sunday.
CL&P reported 730,000 customers out in the state Sunday morning. That number had increased by 12 p.m. Sunday. There were 15 electrical substations out.
The company has 300 crews working, in addition to helicopters surveying damage as of Sunday morning.
“Given the sheer magnitude of the damage, it is going to be a lengthy restoration process,” said Jeff Butler, CL&P’s president.
Both UI and CL&P said they were still assessing damage Sunday morning, but UI stressed they expect to have power restored to all customers by Monday night.
Cell phone coverage is expected to worsen as Sunday drags on, thanks to transmission line damage, Malloy said at noon Sunday.
Thirty-two emergency shelters were open as of noon.
The Sunday Morning Numbers:
Ansonia: 632
Beacon Falls: 1652 (61 percent of town)
Derby: 8
Oxford: 4446 (84 percent of town — 30 percent increase since 10:45 p.m.)
Seymour: 4155 (55 percent)
Shelton: 1641
Saturday Night Recap:
Firefighters throughout the Valley had been responding to a seemingly endless number of calls regarding downed trees and wires Saturday afternoon and Saturday night.
Shelton firefighters responded to 100 calls between 1:30 p.m. Saturday and about 3 a.m. Sunday.
About 9,300 customers were without power in the area as of 6:15 p.m. — with 4,000 United Illuminating customers out in Shelton alone.
The Shelton numbers had decreased early Saturday evening — but then trees started snapping all over Oxford and Seymour.
Emergency Declared In Seymour, Anger In Oxford
In Seymour, Thomas Eighmie, the town’s emergency management director, sent the Valley Indy an e-mail at 7:19 p.m. Saturday saying a state of emergency had been declared locally. Officials were warning residents that it could be 16 hours before power comes back on.
In Oxford, where so many wires were down firefighters got out of a truck and walked to one emergency call, First Selectwoman Mary Ann Drayton-Rogers said CL&P dropped the ball, just like the utility company did in the days after Tropical Storm Irene earlier this year.
Drayton-Rogers, along with other local leaders, were dismayed with the utility company’s slow response and lack of communication after Tropical Storm Irene.
On Saturday, Drayton-Rogers said she would send CL&P a bill.
“CL&P’s response to this storm has a been a huge disappointment with no crews in town at this time and none promised to the town,” Drayton-Rogers said in an e-mail late Saturday.
Major electrical transmission lines were down in Oxford on Route 34 and Chestnut Tree Hill Road, where trees were reported burning in Naugatuck State Forest.
“Their storm preparation has been nonexistent, leaving us high and dry to fend for ourselves. I will be sending all overtime costs of keeping police and public works employees out all day and all night to the utility company to cover,” Drayton-Rogers said. “Our fireman, who are strictly volunteers deserve to be paid what the CL&P crews are paid for their efforts as well.”
“This poor response from CT Light & Power is not going to be tolerated. All our meetings following Hurricane Irene have fallen on deaf ears,” Drayton-Rogers concluded.
No Quick Fix
At a press conference at the state’s Emergency Operations Center in Hartford Saturday evening, Gov. Dan Malloy declared a state of emergency — and said those without electricity should not expect a quick fix.
The wind and falling snow make it too dangerous to make repairs to the power grid, the governor said. Information on restoration efforts won’t be given until 8:30 a.m. Sunday, Malloy said.
“If you are without power you should expect to be without power for a long time,” Malloy said. Some 650,000 customers of CL&P and UI were without electricity as of 11:30 p.m. Saturday.
Malloy urged people to stay off the roads Saturday.
It was a repeat of a message that went out earlier in Oxford and Seymour.
The Town of Oxford send out a “code red” message telling residents roads were treacherous.
The Seymour Office of Emergency Management issued a Tweet asking people to stay off the roads.
United Illuminating, who did not communicate well during Tropical Storm Irene, sent out several Tweets Saturday saying the company’s entire work crew had been called in or the storm.
“Traveling is obviously dangerous. We want people to stay off the roads as much as possible,” Malloy said.
Malloy said the number of people losing electricity in the state during Saturday’s storm was outpacing the rate during Hurricane Gloria in the 1980s.
Quaint, At First
The thick snow flakes Saturday started falling around noon, looking rather pleasant if a bit odd against autumnal foliage.
By 2 p.m., the local emergency radio channels sounded like all hell was breaking loose.
Shelton was hit hard immediately. Route 110 was closed from Wheeler Road to the Monroe line Saturday afternoon. A school bus of some kind was stuck in the area of Leavenworth Road. The occupants took refuge in a nearby residence. Power and communications were briefly lost at the Shelton Police Department, according to an emergency radio transmission.
As Saturday wore on, sagging tree limbs started snapping everywhere in the Valley, bringing down wires and causing power failures.
By 10:45 p.m. Saturday, the numbers were:
Ansonia: 628 UI customers without power
Derby: Seven
Oxford: 2,880 — or a whopping 54 percent of all CL&P customers
Seymour: 3,494 — or 46 percent of all CL&P customers
Shelton: 2,822
View the story “Snow? Are You Kidding Me?” on Storify]