Oxford Firefighters Busy During Storm

Local emergency crews were busy Monday night, working all evening to make sure residents were safe after a hard-hitting thunderstorm struck Oxford and other parts of the state.

Hard rains accompanied with some hail and large wind gusts brought down trees, knocked out power to hundreds of residents and caused traffic concerns all over town.

Oxford Fire Chief Scott Pelletier, who also serves as the town’s emergency management director, said about 40 volunteer firefighters responded to several incidents all over town. The following is a list of the calls as provided by Pelletier: 

• on a residential property at 251 Oxford Road, or Route 67, and ripped power lines from the house. Although the tree did not strike the house head on, it caused some damage to the home, which was occupied by homeowner Deborah Torrey at the time of the incident. Nobody was injured and building inspectors determined the house was safe after Connecticut Light & Power crews cut power to the home to the home.
• Firefighters responded to a possible lightning strike of a home at 77 Riggs St. which knocked out some circuit breakers and caused minimal damage to the house.
• At 306 Oxford Road, a tree came down across power lines.
• At 73 Park Road, a tree branch fell on a car; nobody was injured but the vehicle was damaged.
• At 10 Rees Drive, lightning either struck a house or struck something nearby.
• At 29 Cheyenne Drive, a tree fell and knocked down power lines.
• At 43 Peach Farm Road, firefighters believe lightning struck a chimney.
• Trees and wires were also down on Peach Farm Road.
• Firefighters were called back to 306 Oxford Road after a tree branch caught fire; firefighters quickly extinguished it without incident.

Pelletier said there were no calls for flooding and nobody was injured.

While close to 900 CL&P customers were without power as of Monday night, there were only five customers, or .1 percent of customers in Oxford, who were still without power as of noon on Tuesday, according to CL&P’s website.