Update: Ellington and Somers Clean up From Irene

If you look up at the sky the day after Hurricane Irene, you wouldn't know anything happened. The sun is shining and the birds are singing.

Then you look at the ground. That's when you see the small branches and leaves blown around, and in some places, larger branches or whole trees on the ground or on the powerlines.

At noon on Monday, powerlines on Pinney Street in Ellington and Main Street in Somers had been removed from where they crossed the road. On Jobs Hill Road in Ellington however, there was still a tree on some powerlines. 

Some cars were passing under the tree and the lines, though that is not advised. There was also a tree remaining on some lines on Main Street in Somers.

In Somers, schools were closed on Monday, but will be open on Tuesday and the buses will be running. The Board of Education meeting scheduled for Monday night was also canceled.

Somers Fire Chief Gary Schiessl said that the department had well over 20 volunteers who manned the station from Saturday evening to Sunday evening.

He said that department responded to approximately 30 calls for service during that time period, including tree and wires down, medical calls, and alarms. 

"We worked with the town of Somers Emergency Operations staff and the public works department to monitor which roads were blocked or flooded so that we could bypass those areas when responding to various areas of town," he said.

Selectman Kathy Devlin said that in the aftermath of Hurricane Irene, the Somers has opened most roads and that the problem that remains is lack of electricity. For a list of roads that are closed, or partially closed, click here.

Also added to this list are Beverly Drive at approximately house No. 5, Kibbe Grove Road at the bridge due to a tree down on power lines, and Stafford Road.

At 4:45 p.m., 66 percent of Somers residents who have service from Connecticut Light and Power still did not have power. Even Subway and Dunkin Donuts were closed because of the lack of power.

Devlin said that the town has been notified that service will be restored in five to eight days. To help Somers residents cope with hurricane related issues, here are a few things to know: 

• Potable water will be available at the Somers Fire House, Main Street, from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Residents must bring their own containers
• Toilets and showers are available at Mabelle Avery Middle School from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. Bring your own toiletries and towels.
• Calss to obtain current information concerning available facilities, i.e. gas stations open, grocery store opening, transfer station openings, power restoration, etc. can be made to the town hall, which is now open.
• The Kibbe Fuller School for seniors has been replaced with the Somers Senior Center, which is now open.
• The Town of Somers Transfer Station will be open everyday this week for Town of Somers Residents only. Tree debris (leaves, branches, limbs, etc) will be taken by the Transfer Station Free of Charge for Residents. This week only, the Transfer Station will be open Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. and will not enforce the purchase of a new transfer station pass. The station will be open on Sunday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
• Updated information relating to Resident Services and power restoration following Hurricane Irene will be posted at the following locations: Town Hall Board, Town of Somers Web site, Ellington-Somers Patch, www.somersnow.com, the board in front of Bank of America, the Kibbe Fuller Board, and the Somers Senior Center Board.

In Ellington, 67 percent of CL&P customers still didn't have power. This number is down from this morning, but those without power are still finding it very inconvenient.

Rachel Larson, who lives in the Deer Valley Townhomes in Ellington, was at McDonald's because she doesn't have any power at home. At noon, the restaurant was packed with people getting food and doing work.

Larson works at UConn and is also a part time PhD student so she was doing a little bit of work for both. She has a 1-year-old daughter at home, who she said loves to be outside and didn't understand why she couldn't go out and play yesterday. Daycare has power so while she went and played at daycare on Monday, mom got some work done.

"You have to take all the time you can when daycare is open and you don’t have to go to work," Larson said.

Larson said that her family is from the Midwest originally and is used to tornado warnings. She said she was a little concerned with their first hurricane, but that her partner wasn't as concerned. He did get her non-perishable food items though.

Larson said that she packed some clothes and that the family was prepared to go into the basement, but that they didn't have to do that.

She said that only a few branches came down around the complex, but that that could be due to the fact that the complex is fairly new and doesn't have a lot of well established trees.

Power is still out in some of the Deer Valley buildings, but it has returned to portions of others. Three buildings continue to have no power, and Larson is in one of those buildings.

"It seems like the later your power went out, the earlier you’re getting it back on," she said. "Which stinks, but I shouldn’t complain, we at least had it until 11 (on Sunday) and I know a lot of people had power out at 7 in the morning. It could have been worse."

While the laptops can be charged at work, the thought of not having power for a week was a little unsettling though.

"I don’t know what to do at that point," she said. "We were lucky to take a fairly warmish shower today, I don’t know how long that will last. I know we’re on city water so I’m hoping that that has something to do with it. As long as daycare is fine and our jobs are fine, I think we’ll be okay."

Not everything to do with the storm was bad, however.

"Everybody in the community has been really nice," Larson said. "We let some people in our building use our grill last night and they all just cooked a bunch of meat on there and we got some zucchini bread as a thank you. People are very sweet."