Season’s 1st nor’easter hits
The wind gusts intensified Tuesday night as a powerful autumn nor’easter blew into the state, causing power outages as utility crews responded to storm damage reports.
Winds started to pick up in the evening, as coastal communities braced for 75 mph gusts and power outages that could last for days. There’s a greater chance for tree damage during this storm because of fully leafed trees and the wet ground.
National Weather Service meteorologist Kevin Cadima said he was “pretty confident” there would be widespread power outages because of the strong winds, and those blackouts started to jump on the state’s map shortly after the gusts picked up.
Nearly 5,000 customers were without power across the Bay State as of 7 p.m., and Gloucester was the hardest hit community at that time. About 25% of the coastal community was in the dark, according to the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency map.
Utility crews were responding to storm damage reports around the region.
“We’ve been actively preparing this week for the first nor’easter of the season, strategically positioning crews and other resources across the commonwealth, particularly along coastal areas fore
casted to experience damaging wind gusts,” an Eversource spokesperson said in a statement.
“We are closely monitoring several forecast models and will shift those crews and resources as necessary to the hardest-hit communities so that we are able to respond to and restore any power outages as quickly as
safely possible for our customers,” the spokesperson added.
National Grid had in place nearly 2,411 fieldbased personnel as part of its emergency response operations across New England. This included overhead line, forestry, contractors, underground, damage assessment, wires
down, transmission and substation workers.
“We’ve been closely monitoring this storm and have secured additional overhead and forestry crews as part of our emergency response plan,” a National Grid spokesperson said. “In the event of a power outage, our crews and support teams will be working for as
long as needed to restore service as quickly as conditions allow.”
After the brunt of the storm early today, things were expected to start to settle down in the late morning.
Much quieter and mainly dry weather should return Thursday into at least part of Friday. Then a frontal sys
tem could bring periods of rain, heavy at times, Friday night into Saturday night.
But Cadima of the National Weather Service’s Boston office added of the weekend storm, “It won’t be anything like this nor’easter.
Halloween on Sunday should be dry and seasonable for trick-or-treaters.