UPDATE: Wild Winds kill Power to Thousands in US Northeast
Pastor Dale Morgan
UPDATE: Wild Winds kill Power to Thousands in US Northeast*
Sunday October 29, 2006 9:16 PM
NEW YORK (AP) - One Hundred Thousand homes and businesses had no
electricity Sunday from Maryland to Maine as a storm system blasted the
region with wind gusting to more than 50 mph, knocking over trees and a
tall construction crane. The storm was blamed for two deaths.
Gusts as high as 70 mph were possible Sunday in parts of northern New
York state, the National Weather Service said.
A tree toppled by the wind killed a motorcyclist in Massachusetts,
police said. In New Hampshire, one man was missing after falling off a
cruise ship on Lake Winnipesaukee during the storm late Saturday, and
one man drowned when his kayak overturned on a rain-swollen river, state
officials said.
In hard-hit Maine, a 165-foot crane with a wrecking ball attached
toppled in one of the most populous neighborhoods of Portland, falling
on three houses. No injuries were reported.
The wrecking ball narrowly missed a car. ``The first thing I saw was the
ball coming down really fast about 10 feet from us. It hit the roadway,
and the rest of the crane just fell on the buildings in front of us,''
said Colleen Mowatt, 48, of Gorham, Maine, whose boyfriend hit the
brakes in the nick of time.
Utilities in Maine reported 44,000 customers still in the dark at midday
Sunday, and said wind gusting to 50 mph was causing new outages even as
crews tried to restore service.
New Jersey's Newark Liberty International Airport, one of three major
airports for the New York City region, had wind-caused delays of up to 2
hours, mostly for incoming flights, according to authorities.
New York City's Central Park measured 2.54 inches of rain from the storm
Saturday.
Power outages elsewhere across the region still affected more than two
dozen communities Sunday across New Hampshire, 9,500 homes and
businesses in Massachusetts, 1,500 customers in Rhode Island, 2,900 in
Maryland, 5,000 in New Jersey, 4,700 on New York's Long Island and
15,500 in upstate New York, state and utility officials said.
The 10,000 residents of Massachusetts' Nantucket Island lost 911 service
but still had regular phone service, Verizon Communications Inc. said.
The weather observatory atop New Hampshire's 6,288-foot Mount
Washington, famous for severe weather at almost any time of the year,
reported sustained wind of 100 mph and a gust to 114 mph. A 1934 gust to
231 mph atop the mountain remains a world record. The peak also got 11
inches of snow during the night for an October total of 39 inches.
The storm produced heavy ``lake effect'' snowfall in parts of New York
state downwind from Lake Ontario, including 9 inches at Old Forge, the
weather service said. A winter storm warning was in effect for the area
Sunday with as much as 18 inches of snow possible at higher elevations.
The wind, rain and snow were produced by a stronger-than-normal low
pressure system that passed through Pennsylvania and New York on its way
to southeastern Canada, the weather service said.