BRANFORD -- Up to 65 mile per hour winds along with heavy rain and flooding Friday created a nightmare for people across the state and region.
“I was down here having a cup of coffee and the neighbor called me across the street and said we’re losing power and we were out of power till 3 o’clock Saturday afternoon,” said Branford resident Tom Guerrera.
In all, Guerrera said he and his family were without power for just under 24 hours.
“Didn’t think we were going to lose power,” Guerrera said. “Had no idea the winds were going to be as bad as they were.”
And they were bad.
“Our power was lost and it was really cold so we decided to hit the road to Connecticut last night,” said Edward Gold.
Gold is actually staying at his family’s Branford house for the weekend after his Westchester, New York home lost power.
“Oh, I think my entire neighborhood is probably 2000 houses that are out,” Gold said. Still and we’ve been told that power won’t be restored until tomorrow.”
So Gold spent some of his Sunday at Common Grounds coffee shop on Main Street.
Over in Guilford, some families also woke up in the dark.
Hank Chen’s family has been without power for two days.
“So we feel real cold. Because now, last night down to 30°,” Chen said.
The research scientist said the inconvenience is getting in the way of his job.
“Now I suppose I have to email my boss to update what I have been done on Friday,” Chen said. “But now I don’t have internet. No power no internet.”
He has no idea when either will be back.
Eversource is working with utility crews from multiple states across the country to restore power. They said they expected the majority of customers to get power back by late Sunday evening.
As for their response time, Guerrera said it could be worse.
“The hurricane eight years ago. We were out of power for about three weeks,” Guerrera said. So this is pretty quickly. "