“We have all underground utilities. It’s the lines that connect TO these that cause power outages.”
Exactly. They lines eventually have to come above ground somewhere.
In the older section of my town where I live the lines run behind the houses. People use to pitch a fit when the power company tried to trim the trees, too. We used to lose power if someone sneezed. A few years ago the power company finally started doing more tree trimming every 3 years instead of five and replacing lines/boxes etc., that they had only patched for years since an early fall snow storm about 25 year ago! We haven’t lost power since an ice storm in 2009, iirc.
I live on a very small loop - only 30 houses if that, and when we’ve lost power we were always the last to get ours back as they work on those which get the most houses back on line first.
My guy used the same models that every other meteorologist was using, but also used his training and knowledge to predict the lower snow amounts. He only forecasts for my county, so he is somewhat of an expert on what to expect. But he said that a clipper that “bombs” rarely ever produces heavy snow in our area. Everyone else was predicting the end of the world for my county.
Also, regarding taking the average of models, I’ve heard meteorologists state that that is a faux pas, so I was surprised when the Weather Channel did it last night.
After the two October storms where trees toppled on power lines, there is a LOT less complaining about tree trimming in this state. And really, in those two storms, the marginal trees came down.
My mother’s neighborhood in Wilton, which is mostly wooded, is full of trees that look as if they are going to topple in the next storm. And they frequently do. You would think that after Irene, Sandy, and Snowtober, there would be fewer rotten trees, but they seem to have an infinite supply!
My high-rise has lost water or power on a couple of occasions when crews were rebuilding the subway station on the corner. Seems they turned off the flow for their own purposes without realizing the line fed hundreds or thousands of homes. Whoops! You’d think there would be some kind of label on the tap. They got it back on the same day, though.
“He was on the local Fox station. It was a bit unusual to hear Andrew Cuomo admit to a mea culpa. Hmmm.”
H thinks he may finally be mellowing just a tad. There was not the usual frenzy and unreasonable orders passed down from A with this storm. It was so well run that H was home by 7:30 last night. I think A decided to leave the operation to the professionals, for a change, this time.
Also, a few of A’s closest lieutenants have left and trying to talk reason to them, according to H, was like talking to a wall.
Local news (near NYC) says the meteorologists “missed the call”.
We only will get 12" of snow, without high winds.
Prediction was 12" - 24" of snow with high winds, across the board reported by local news as “2 feet”.
I don’t think they missed by too much, glad to not have the high winds.
I actually know something about meteorology, and what most people don’t get is that it is based mostly on historical data, like:
On 100 days where we had these conditions in these 200 locations, this is what happened the highest percentage of the time.
Now that is of course tempered by how good the original data was. And our very poor understanding of what is really happening in the atmosphere.
However, there are more than enough people getting a lot of snow with high winds - Boston area is hit pretty bad, getting close to three feet or more of snow already.
Hanna, sometimes they have to turn the power off when working on sections of the lines. They can’t exactly fix these when they are live. This includes during construction.
Ditto water lines. They can’t exactly be fixed when they are full, and running.
Often when there are power outages near here, there will be a period of time when it is pretty clear they flipped the switch so the crews could work on the lines. It’s a safety thing for those crews.
Yes Emilybee, I agree that the NY State operation seemed to have been run very well during this snow event. Can’t speak for the folks in Suffolk County but I have heard no major complaints broadcast from there this morning.
LakeWashington, When it comes to some of the counties - and especially Suffolk, according to H - there is a lot of puffing up of chests and the county exec/county emergency management not wanting the State to interfere. I think that was part of the reason a few years ago when the cars where stranded on the LIE for so long - they didn’t want to state to come in and take over the op.
NW CT here…I think the snow is winding down. Just about stopped. We have 11 inches on our deck…but we had at least 3 before this all started from last weekend. But it is still windy…and there is a lot of drifting snow to be moved.
Guess I better bundle up so I can do my share to clear it all!
@Consolation – I am not far from Wilton and I agree with you completely! It amazed me every time we lost power b/c I didn’t understand how there could be any weak trees left to fall. There was one other storm before the three you mentioned: March 2010 when power was out for six days and longer in some areas. There were utility poles blocking sections of roads so that residents could only get in or out on foot. Canadian crews finally restored our power.
I have started confusing the details of all these storms and power outages b/c there were four from March 2010 to October 2012, but we awoke thrilled to find our power still on after one where much of the town lost power. 12 hours later in the sunshine, a neighbor’s tree just came by the saturated roots and knocked out power for 20 homes!
CL&P has been much more proactive in trimming trees but we still have a lot that can fall.
I work in Wilton and hoped that my company would have closed which it hasn’t. I may end up having to take a vacation day even though I’m working from home. It has stopped snowing here in Southbury.
DH cleared the driveway and sidewalk. He thinks we got 15-18" in central CT. With the blowing and drifting, it’s hard to come up with an exact amount. BIL in Suffolk county has 2 feet.
Just spoke with son in SW CT. He arranged a work from home day so that he could stay at our house, (we are in FL for the winter) and he works in Bronx. He brought my mother, her aide, my aunt and her aide to our house. We don’t lose power too often and we have a generator. He arranged for someone to plow because of the depth of snow predicted, (our snowblower is broken). Bless him, I don’t know what I would do without him.
Here in SW Nassau County we have about 10-12 inches. It has stopped now and the sun is trying to come out. I thought that it was a good call to declare state of emergency and get people off the roads-better safer than sorry. As for the subway system, they did shut it down for both hurricanes and they did not shut it down in 2010, where we had much more snow and there were people stuck on trains overnight, the same with the LIRR and Metro-North. I was home before 5 PM yesterday and it was really starting to get going and after an early morning lull, we had the storm intensify again through mid-morning so there was quite a bit of blowing and drifting snow. My office in midtown shut down at 2 PM and announced they would be closed today, not that anyone would have been able to get there unless they lived in walking distance and there are a few folk that are in that category.
