Town 'Bombarded' With Calls Over Power Outages: Supervisor

NORTH FORK, NY — With more than 300,000 without power Tuesday night after the wrath of Tropical Storm Isaias, Southold Town was struggling with the aftermath.

"We have been bombarded with calls over outages," Southold Town Supervisor Scott Russell said. "Apparently PSEG's call center crashed and we do not know how reliable their outage numbers are. We have kept officers who finished their shift on. We are having difficulty keeping up with the road closures primarily because we are waiting for PSEG crews."

And, Russell said, with trees down and several roads closed throughout town: "Many of the trees are entangled with power wires so we can't cut and remove them until PSEG gets on the scene."

Southold Town Highway Supervisor Vincent Orlando said trees were down all over town, including one on Grand Avenue in Mattituck. Power lines were tangled in that tree, he said. He added that a tree reportedly hit a car in Southold.

"We are experiencing communications issues and are working with Verizon and other partners to resolve this matter as quickly as possible," a media representative for PSEG Long Island said.