"Thousands Blacked Out Across Northeast"

[GreenPartyVoter]

BOSTON (AP) - Thousands of people across the Northeast had no electricity for alarm clocks and air conditioners Monday following waves of violent thunderstorms.

Wind gusting to 80 mph knocked trees onto power lines, lightning started fires and torrential rain flooded streets in parts of eastern Pennsylvania, northern New Jersey, southeastern New York, Connecticut and eastern Massachusetts on Sunday.

"It's really testing our crews. It's pretty extensive," Connecticut Light & Power spokesman Mitch Gross said of the damage late Sunday.

Boston's South Shore was hit particularly hard, with severe flooding in Quincy, Braintree, Weymouth and Brockton.

"Half of the city is under water," Brockton police dispatcher Darrelyn Jordan said Sunday night. "We have reports of water going into basements all over the city. We've had people stuck in cars all over the city. We even had to tow a police cruiser out of there with water flowing over the hood."

http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/20050815/D8C0A2500.html?PG=home&SEC=news

[Rabrrrrrr]

1. And wasn't the big outage last year on August 12?

Kinda close.

:-)

[Armstead]

2. It was weird

Where I live the worst of the storms missed the house by a few miles but we could hear it. Late afternoon was a constant -- literally constant -- sound of thunder non-stop.

[northzax]

3. I was at Bradley last night

much talk of storms, and I know there were some in Springfield, but Bradley didn't get hit while I was there. Strange.

[pointblank]

4. Shit, I live in St. Louis and I haven't had power since Sat. 8/13...

at around 3pm from these 'horrible' storms!!!!!!!

I am so pissed off. I mean, with all of the technology out there today and one wimpy storm knocks out 120,000 customers in my area for almost TWO DAYS and counting??!!

They told me it was a TREE that fell into a substation feeder...WHY ISNT THE F-ING SUBSTAION COVERED AND PROTECTED!!!!!

All of my food in my fridge is going to have to be thrown out, my house is a sweatbox....I cant watch TV or use my home PC!!!! (I'm spoiled, I admit it.) :cry:

My friggin neighbors who have generators ran the goddamn things ALL NIGHT last night, so naturally I slept like shit.

I know I shouldn't really be this upset because my plight is miniscule to many people throughout the world, but it not only ticks me off it scares me....

If one wimpy strom can do this much dsmage to our electrical infrastrucure, what would happen if something REALLY bad happened?? :nuke:

End rant.

[Cassandra]

5. I wish communities would calculate...

how much it costs every year to restring overhead power lines and compare that to the expense of burying them, as in NYC. When we lose power from a downed tree, the tree is in another state.