Hundreds of thousands of New Englanders were left without power Monday after a storm brought heavy rain and strong winds to the region. Power restoration continued on Tuesday.
In Maine, Central Maine Power reported that 330,634 customers had no power as of 5:40 a.m.
The Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency reported as many as 285,000 customers without power at the peak of outages Monday. By 5:30 a.m. Tuesday, that number was at 136,789.
Connecticut had more than 63,000 customers without power, resulting in dozens of school closures. At 5:25 a.m. Tuesday, that number went down to 27,000.
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Rhode Island still had more than 8,000 customers without power as of 5:34 a.m. Tuesday. New Hampshire's four main electric providers were reporting more than 5,000 customers without power at the same time, while there were just 57 without power in Vermont.
According to MEMA, 92% of residents in the South Shore town of Scituate were without power. Other Massachusetts communities with more than 80% of customers without power included Millis, Rochester, Plainville and Duxbury.
National Grid is reporting significant damage to feeder lines coming out of a substation in Hanover that serves Scituate and other area communities.
The Scituate Emergency Management Agency said in a press release Monday afternoon that full power restoration could take up to 72 hours from the conclusion of the storm. Residents are being urged to stay off the roads if possible to allow National Grid to begin clean-up and power restoration efforts.
The senior center, town library and town hall are open during the day for warming and to charge devices. Click here for a list of hours.
Monday's storm brought strong winds and heavy, flooding rains to the region through the afternoon hours.
The storm made for a messy commute and is caused major damage across the region.
When will power be back on?
Eversource and National Grid said they have hundreds of line and tree crews working to restore power to their customers in Massachusetts. Additional contract crews are also being brought in to support the restoration effort.
"National Grid has secured additional crews and personnel across Massachusetts to respond as quickly and safely as possible to damage from this storm," said Tim Moore, National Grid's vice president for Electric Operations for New England. “We remain focused on public safety today as our line and forestry workers work to assess and repair power systems in affected communities. Our crews will be working to restore power to affected areas as quickly and safely as we can.”
“We know the timing of this storm is terrible as people are trying to enjoy time off or prepare for the Christmas holiday,” added Eversource President of Regional Electric Operations Craig Hallstrom. “The fierce winds and heavy rains brought down trees and limbs that caused significant damage to the electric system and widespread power outages in most of Eastern Massachusetts, as well as communities in Western Massachusetts."
Both power companies said the outages are so widespread that it will take some time to restore power to everyone, but they will have crews working around the clock.
Unitil, which provides electricity to customers in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, said the seacoast region of New Hampshire was especially hard hit, with numerous broken utility poles contributing to outages in the area.
