NEW LONDON — A storm system moving through New London left one person dead, power outages and damage in it’s wake.
Police said one person has died after a tree came down and landed on a car Wednesday morning shortly before 10 a.m.
Police said the incident happened at 185 Pequot Ave. There were two people were in the car, one was pronounced dead on the scene, but the other survived. Their identities have not been released.
People living in the apartment complex were shaken up by the incident, some said they ran to try and help however they could.
“I heard a loud bang and then I didn’t know what it was and my neighbor came running over pounding on everyone’s doors saying call 911 someone call 911,” Caryn Giglio, a resident at the apartment complex, said.
Eugene Gibson, also a resident, told FOX61 he went to the driver first to try and help.
“I said are you alright can you hear me can you hear me, no response,” Gibson described, adding he then heard cries for help from a passenger. “All of the sudden I hear ‘Help! Help’ so I run around that way to the other side go up underneath. He says ‘Eugene help me! Eugene help me!”
Gibson said those cries for help were coming from a young man who is his neighbor in the apartment complex. The passenger was later taken out of the car by emergency crews. He was taken to Lawrence Memorial Hospital for non life threatening injuries.
Neighbors told FOX61 the car and the driver were part of a local taxi service and the passenger was being picked up. They said he had just gone into the car when the tree fell.
Several other communities in the southeast part of the state were also left with storm damage. Waterford Police said numerous trees were knocked down into wires, especially in the south part of town.
GROTON
“It’s wet. The tree was in the house!”
Donna Perry was confused and frightened when she heard the loud boom in an adjacent room just a few feet from where she was sitting.
“The tree limb was piercing right through my house,” exclaimed Perry.
The quick, strong storm blew a 1,000lbs tree limb right through the roof of her house. Neighbors quickly came to her aid and made sure no one was hurt. A tree service quickly came and cleaned her front yard of any dangerous debris lingering around.
But Perry’s roof wasn’t the only damage recorded in the city Wednesday morning.
dozens of homes and cars were damaged as trees were uprooted and flung several feet through the morning air. No one was injured in the city during the storm however, city leaders say the damage provided a useful lesson for upcoming storms.
“This is a great opportunity for us to look at what we did today and then next week we’re going to get together,” says Groton City Mayor Keith Hedrick. “My staff, department heads and I are basically going to do a hogwash or debrief and say, ‘what could have went better?’ Do we need better communications on this? Do we need better coordination so that we can better serve the citizens here in the City of Groton?”
Mayor Hedrick says the storm knocked out power to 50 percent of the homes in the city. He adds the power will be restored fully by midnight.
Stefan Aleo sent video of a transformer fire.
Groton Town Police Chief Louis J. Fusaro, Jr. said there were trees down in Groton with debris everywhere. Many trees and branches were down in the area of 200 Eastern Point Rd. near the Electric Boat factory.
Waterford police say several road closures will be impacting bus traffic for those getting out of school. The school is working on how to get around the blocks.
Here’s a list of the roads:
- Shore Rd from new shore to #60 closed
- Great Neck Rd from Shore RD to West Neck Rd – closed
- Great Neck Rd at Ridgewood Ave – closed
- Prindiville Rd – closed
- Dimmock Rd at Mayfair – closed
