By Allison Perrine | Photos by Patrick Olivero
NEW JERSEY – Tropical Storm Isaias hit the Jersey Shore for only a few hours Tuesday, Aug. 4, but its impacts can still be felt.
The storm left roughly 1.4 million New Jerseyans without power Tuesday, with about 977,000 still awaiting restoration as of Wednesday afternoon, Aug. 5. Winds reached 50, 60 and even 70 miles per hour at times and left “considerable” damage with trees and poles down throughout the state, according to Joe Fiordaliso, president of the state Board of Public Utilities.
“If you were to ask me what region of New Jersey was hit the hardest, I would have difficulty in explaining or recognizing any particular area. The entire state was ravaged by this quick-moving storm,” said Fiordaliso.
During the peak of Super Storm Sandy, about 1.7 million state residents were left without power – putting the impacts from Isaias not far behind with 1.4 million outages. Regionally, Fiordaliso said, 3.5 million were without power in 14 states and New Jersey got “literally whacked” as the storm left its mark statewide.
According to representatives of Jersey Central Power & Light (JCP&L), a FirstEnergy company, about 4,000 utility personnel have been working to restore power in its service territory. About 1,300 additional external line workers are being deployed and two more staging sites are being established in Forked River and North Flemington.
“As the Tropical Storm crossed our JCP&L and Met-Ed service territories, heavy winds and rain caused thousands of instances of downed wires, broken poles and crossarms, and damaged transformers caused by trees and other debris contacting our electrical equipment,” said Samuel L. Belcher, senior vice president and president of FirstEnergy Utilities, in a press release. “Though repair work can be slowed by unsafe working conditions and numerous road closures, we will continue to work around the clock to safely make repairs and deploy resources as needed until power to all customers has been restored.”
As of 10 a.m. Wednesday, about 788,000 customers in northern and central New Jersey had lost power from the storm, and 565,000 remained without service. The hardest hit areas were in Monmouth, Ocean and Morris counties, according to JCP&L. The company is offering free water and ice due to the service loss Tuesday. According to JCP&L, locations in Monmouth County include Acme Supermarkets in Fair Haven, Freehold and Wall Township; Foodtowns in Ocean Township, Sea Girt and Atlantic Highlands; and Saker ShopRites in Freehold, Morganville, Neptune, West Long Branch, Shrewsbury, Howell, Wall, Aberdeen and Hazlet.
NJ Transit was one company that felt the burden of the storm and had to cancel some of its rail services as more than 250 trees went down along and across its tracks. Some of its rides have resumed, but more information is available at njtransit.com. Residents can also find more information about emergency updates, generator safety tips, power outage information and more at ready.nj.gov.
“For some residents we know that restoration may take some time, counting in days instead of hours,” said Gov. Phil Murphy Wednesday afternoon. “The legacy of this storm is going to be power outages.”
An excess of 2,000 crews are now coming from Canada, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Washington D.C. and many midwestern states to assist in the restoration process, said Fiordaliso. Though out-of-area travelers from 35 states and territories are being asked to immediately self-quarantine in New Jersey for two weeks, this is essential out-of-state travel, said Murphy.
According to Middletown Mayor Tony Perry, at the peak of the storm Tuesday about 94 percent of township households did not have power. By 6 p.m., 88 percent did not have power. And by Wednesday morning at about 10 a.m., according to his most recent briefing with JCP&L, about 56 percent, or 15,000 households, did not have power. He was told that power would resume later that day.
“The scary part was this storm rolled through and within an hour or two, it was a beautiful Tuesday,” said Perry. “That’s when the cleanup started.”
Perry said there was no severe damage done to Middletown property during the storm. Some trees fell, but none were reported to have fallen into homes or buildings, nor had they injured anyone. Traffic lights were out throughout the township. Residents were permitted to park their vehicles in the Middletown Train Station parking lots if they lived in areas prone to flooding and could not move them to higher ground elsewhere. Perry gave a shout-out to township public works employees and JCP&L crew members who worked all night fixing these issues.
Oceanport Mayor Jay Coffey said there was a similar outcome in the borough, with a “good number” of trees that fell down on borough streets and in parks, but no catastrophic damage. At the peak of the storm Tuesday there were about 2,300 residents without power in Oceanport; by Wednesday afternoon at about 12:30 there were about 850 whose power still had not been restored. While power is slowly returning, it is still “incredibly frustrating” for those who do not have it, he said.
In Sea Bright, Mayor Brian Kelly said there were no long-term power outages – and trees have never been a big factor in the waterfront borough. Kelly told The Two River Times Wednesday that there had not been any flooding yet and that he saw restaurants operating Tuesday night and were doing “pretty well since many neighboring towns had outages,” he said; the borough police, public works, fire and OEM were “very well prepped” for the storm.
While there is still a ways to go, Fiordaliso estimated that by late Friday night, about 80 percent of customers will have their power restored. But beyond that threshold there may be more difficult situations with isolated cases that take more time to solve, he said. “I was so thrilled – and I know the governor was – that our winter was relatively mild and there were no major snowstorms. But I think they got back at us,” he said. “Our luck ran out.”
The article originally appeared in the August 6 – 12, 2020 print edition of The Two River Times.
