Overhead Line Cause of Branford’s Near Blackout

Mitch Gross Spokesman for CL&P, reported this mornging that an exposed overhead power line was the source of last night’s power outage around 9:50 p.m., which as well as 15 percent of Guilford customers.

By midnight, all but two of the 15,991 customers who lost power last night (there are 16,272 total CL&P customers in Branford) had powered restored, stated Gross. In Guilford, 49 of the 1,500 customers who lost power were still without by midnight.

As the majority of the town sat in a blackout, save for parts of the east side of town and the West Rotary, the feeling online was: “Irene again?”

Gross commented, “Customers are always sensitive toward power outages no matter what. Irene magnified it and we learned from Irene and we are continuing to learn from Irene but this was a completely separate issue last night.”

Gross said crews are working now in the area of the substation in Branford where power was lost but he would not state which substation it was. Gross said the area is swampy and crews are trying to get to the areas they need to to find the source of last night’s outage. Now the power is back on due to rerouting.

“We don’t know if the weather was directly related or not,” said Gross.

When asked if Irene made CL&P more area of customer concerns he said, “Irene is history. This was another storm; heavy rains and there’s no time to think about the past. It’s time to get it fixed and get it done now.”