Power slowly being restored, but many still living in cold, dark

(WTNH) - Gov. Dannel Malloy admitted that he was "disappointed" and "underwhelmed" with the outside assistance in getting the power restored after the Autumn Nor'easter.

During his 11:45am press conference, Malloy said that each time CL&P made a promise regarding the number of crews they had coming from outside Connecticut's borders, they failed to deliver.

Bill Bryan from the Department of Energy compared Tropical Storm Irene and the Autumn Nor'easter's effects on the state to the damage done in 2005 with Rita and Katrina, and 2008's Ike and Gustav. "This is Connecticut's one-two-punch, in the form of a hurricane and a snowstorm," he said.

He called the circumstances an "incredible undertaking" and reminded residents to be patient, that there was an incredible amount of work to be done.

As of noon, CL&P was reporting 675.782 outages, roughly 54% of their customers, and UI was reported 3,649, a little over 1%.

Earlier in the day, Malloy said one person had died from carbon monoxide poisoning.

The governor said an 80-year-old woman in Enfield died from CO. In another incident in Enfield, a man in his 40's was killed after he came into contact with a live power line.

• Report power outages to CL&P: Call 800-286-2000 or 860-947-2000.
• Report power outages to UI: Call 800-722-5584

CL&P President Jeff Butler said the company has 770 crews working right now; 486 line crews and 284 tree crews. CL&P says it hopes to have power restoration estimates for all cities and towns by Wednesday. There are still more than 675,000 without power.

A few estimates of power restoration were available on CL&P's Website at http://www.cl-p.com/stormcenter/estimates/ . Some towns won't see 99% power restoration until Sunday.

United Illuminating had hoped to have its customers restored last night, but discovered there were an additional 10,000 outages that were not originally accounted for. UI has about 4,000 customers still without power as of 9:00 a.m.

Noting the long lines he's seen, Gov Malloy said there seems to be a "fair amount of panic buying" of gasoline going on. He said it's an electricity problem, not a supply problem and that stations are open and have fuel along the I-95 corridor and in other towns not as badly affected by the storm.

"This is probably not the time to top off a tank unless you like waiting in line," Malloy said. He said the state and the utilities are making it a priority to get power to gas stations and town centers.

In a message sent on Twitter Tuesday morning CL&P said "In hardest hit areas of the state, we continue clearing roads & assessing damage. Our goal is to have estimates for all towns by tomorrow".

Among those without power is CL&P spokesman Mitch Gross. "I'm without power," Gross said On Good Morning Connecticut Tuesday. "We have been out since Saturday night."