As the Valley cleans up from Hurricane Irene damage, thousands of residents remained without power Sunday evening.
The hardest hit towns for power outages were Seymour and Oxford, where about 80 percent of each town was in the dark Sunday evening.
Connecticut Light & Power reported at 3:43 p.m. that about 4,100 customers in Oxford, and 6,000 customers in Seymour were still without power.
In Shelton, United Illuminating reported about 7,500 customers remained in the dark at about 5:40 p.m. — about 43 percent of its customers.
UI had about 1,500 customers, or 18 percent, without power in Ansonia as of 5:40 p.m. Derby had 600 customers, or about 10 percent, without power.
A quick repair was not promised.
Connecticut Light & Power Spokeswoman Ashly Duncan said it could take multiple days, or more than a week, to reinstate power statewide.
That’s because more than 600,000 customers were without electricity across Connecticut.
The crews Sunday evening were focusing on surveying the damage around the state.
Repair crews could not even start making assessments until Irene left Connecticut Sunday afternoon. Top priority is being given to downed live wires and reopening roads and then to places such as hospitals, fire departments, nursing homes and the like.
“The damage from this storm was unprecedented and the restoration process may take a week or longer in some areas,” CL&P said in a statement.
Duncan could not say when repairs would be made in the Valley specifically. Meanwhile, Valley fire departments were still responding to reports of downed wires as of 7:30 p.m., as persistent winds stuck around.
United Illuminating told a similar story. Spokesman Michael West said crews would assess damage in the towns UI serves and make simple repairs on the spot. More involved repairs wouldn’t be handled until at least after an assessment Monday.
Both power companies said they were bringing in crews from around the country to help with the huge effort.
United Illuminating Outage Map
United Illuminating Priority List
CL&P: To report outages or check the status of an outage, visit cl-p.com or call 800-286-2000.
You can also get updates on outages in your town by texting “outage” and your zip code to 24612 (texting fees may apply).
