Update 9:30 p.m. Sunday
As of 9:30 p.m. Sunday, 30.8% of New Canaan homes remained without power, according to Eversource. The figure compares to 3.6% of Darien, 8.8% of Greenwich, 10% of Norwalk, 4.1% of Stamford, 30.1% of Westport and 37.3% of Wilton.
Eversource President of Regional Electric Operations Craig Hallstrom said in a statement, “We know how frustrated our customers who still don’t have power are, and we have thousands of utility workers repairing the extensive damage across the state today who are relentless in their determination to restore power for all customers. We hear our customers and community leaders, and we will not rest until this massive restoration effort is complete.”
New Canaan Library said in a Tweet Sunday, “We will be open to the public in limited capacity on Monday and Tuesday for charging, WiFi, and air conditioning.”
Update 11:30 p.m. Saturday
New Canaan will have its power back by 11:59 p.m. Tuesday, Eversource said—more than one week after more than three-quarters of houses here lost it. Towns such as Westport and Wilton have the same estimate, while Darien is to be restored by 6 p.m. Monday, the utility company said in an update on its website. As of 11:30 p.m. Saturday, 38.5% of New Canaan homes still had no power.
Original Article
About 56% of New Canaan customers remained without power at 5:45 a.m. Saturday, four days after high winds from a tropical storm took down trees and limbs throughout town, officials said.
Eversource, the utility company, said on its website that it expects to have town-by-town restoration estimates Saturday.
“We continue to work urgently to restore power to our customers,” the company said on the website. “We estimate we will make significant progress by the end of the weekend, and have restoration substantially complete by Tuesday at 11:59 p.m.”
The storm hit on the afternoon of Aug. 4, bringing gusts upward of 70 mph and, at its peak, knocking out power to about 90% of New Canaan homes.
Eversource officials have called the damage in some towns worse than Superstorm Sandy. New Canaan’s highest elected official has criticized the company’s response.
Town residents, meanwhile, lost not only their power but, for the first few days after the storm, their phone and Internet access. Hundreds have been coming downtown daily, setting up on folding chairs to use the WiFi outside Town Hall or New Canaan Library.
As of Friday evening, about 30 New Canaan roads remained blocked, First Selectman Kevin Moynihan said in a town-wide outcall.
“Residents using Optimum phone and [I]nternet service remain without service in many parts of town due to lack of power, and AT&T mobile service at the Country Club tower is expected to be restored by early evening,” he said.
Words can not describe how pathetic the response by Eversource has been on this – it takes 4 days to make an estimate on restoration times? The direct and indirect cost to all New Canaan residents is substantial I am sure – not least of which is a risk of increased Covid spread as people need to move about more to get essential goods and services. Our elected officials in Hartford (all the way up to the Governor) should demand real and immediate change in how Eversource operates in the state, including reduced rates for residents as well as real investments that will help with future storms (putting power lines in the ground). Shareholders of Eversource, a regulated energy company, and its leadership have done very well financially the last years – just look at their annual and quarterly reports and equity returns over the last year. There is plenty of room for Connecticut residents to get a better deal than we have now. And if we can’t get one from Eversource we need to bring in real competition – our town and state depends on reliable and cost effective energy – now more than ever.
This is an embarrassment for the state of Connecticut. Stunning ineptitude and lack of leadership on display.
Not to mention exorbitant rates. This is textbook monopolistic behavior. I hope we can put federal emergency funds toward reducing our dependence on Eversource and bringing in real competition.
Just had the 3:30 update from our first selectman. It was essentially a recitation of Eversources’s stats on the state. Nothing on how many crews are working in New Canaan, no news on our town target date of completion and no update on the interaction with Eversource. Instead a script on state statistics, places to go etc. This needs to change. We need outage information that is specific to New Canaan and the steps that our officials are taking to get this moving. Not acceptable.
Very poor when the highest elected official in New Canaan can’t get the power back on at your own Town Hall. Maybe it’s the approach taken, but you can’t fire or ask for the resignation of the power company. Maybe you can get Optimum to restore service too.
This Storm Damage was no where close to the damage from previous storms in New Canaan.
How does our “customers without power” go from 21.8% reported at 9:30am yesterday, Sunday August 9 per the OEM, to the above-mentioned 30.8% at 9:30pm, Sunday night?
Even if the answer is “we had to take some people off in order to fix other areas,” that is crazy-unacceptable at this point, 6 days without power.
Yes.. I called them twice yesterday, as they keep registering me and my neighbors as being restored when the continuing hum of generators obviously means we are not and have not been since Tuesday. I think it is a sad attempt to temporarily boost their restoration numbers. I had two Eversource people explain that when a technician fixes a line they simply assume that everybody down line has been restored, be it 10 homes or 500 homes. In the past they texted you to confirm that your power has been restored, but conveniently they stopped doing that and unless you keep checking and correct it they may just “assume” you’ve been restored. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE POWER DO NOT ASSUME THAT THE EVERSOURCE SYSTEM KNOWS YOU DON’T HAVE POWER. We now have one of the highest outage totals in the state, by town.
I didn’t see any downed wires on my street. Just one broken branch resting on a wire (still there after power was finally restored). The lack of downed wires leads me to strongly suspect that all they had to do was press a button to restore power to the hundreds of people on my street (primarily condos and apartments, with lots of elderly residents) and maybe to the houses on a couple of nearby streets, too. Yet we were without power for almost 5 days, losing freezers-full of food just like people who had serious damage.
Michael D – can you give us all updates on Optimum? Busied out for days now and in-line chat responses have no eta for restoration! Help please.