Outages drop, but thousands still out

(WTNH) - Tens of thousands of Connecticut residents remained without power Sunday following this weekend's nasty storm. Schools in several towns will be closed Monday because of all the damage.

Trees pulled down power lines and high winds ripped shingles off the roofs of homes in Fairfield and New Haven Counties.

School administrators cancelled classes for Monday because of the damage and number of power outages in Darien, Greenwich, New Canaan, Norwalk, Stamford and Westport.

The storm is being blamed for at least two deaths. A tree fell on car on Park Lane in Westport Saturday, killing Jennifer Thibault, 39, of Long Valley, N.J.

The Norwalk Hour reports a Greenwich woman died after she and her husband were struck by a falling tree while walking Saturday evening. Her name was not available.

Connecticut Light & Power reported 63,715 customers were without power as of 10:00 p.m. down significantly from an earlier high of more than 83,000. At one point the Town of New Canaan had more than 60% of its residents without electricity. More than half of the people in Greenwich and Norwalk also had no electricity.

United Illuminating reported 4,679 outages as of 10:30 p.m., most of them in Fairfield. That was down from more than 7,200 earlier in the day.

"Trees were falling down, we would fix things, and branches would come back down again," UI spokeswoman Inita Steeves said. "We have to wait until the tree crew comes and takes the trees down before we can fix things."

CL&P said it has more than 200 utility and tree crews working to restore service to customers, including crews from Massachusetts, Vermont, Ohio and Canada. More crews are expected to arrive on Monday, the company said.

Damage from fallen trees and power lines was reported in many areas. In Westport, a tree fell on the rear of a town fire truck, crushing the bucket and other machinery.

In Canaan, the Department of Transportation reported Route 126 was closed between Routes 7 & 63 due to trees & utility wires down. Another incident closed Route 20 in Winsted by Old Coach Road.

Metro-North had buses running on the New Canaan and Danbury lines early Sunday "due to residual effects from last night's storm." Rail service on the Danbury line was later restored.

More than five and a half inches of rain fell in Eastern parts of Connecticut. Other cities and towns had two to three inches of rain.