Londonderry News

The morning of December 14, 2008 brought new hope for Londonderry and New Hampshire residents. As of 5:30 AM, power had been restored to about 119,000 PSNH customers. With the help of about 180 PSNH line and contract crews and about 120 tree-trimming crews, over 500 outage troubles were repaired throughout the state. “An outage trouble is defined as all of the repairs on a section of line that must be made to restore customers’ power.” There were also a number of electric units that had be completely rebuilt. An additional 120 crews from Maryland, Ohio and Canada were brought in to help with the repairs, bringing the estimate to 500 PSNH line crews.

Even with the amount of help New Hampshire was getting, PSNH was still unable to give a clear estimate as to when all of its customers would get power back. “At this time, we are unable to provide precise answers to individual locations, given the magnitude of the damage and debris that must be removed before wires and equipment can be reconnected or replaced.” It was especially hard because the crews were finding that the debris on roads was making it difficult for the electrical equipment to be reached.

Many residents began to question whether PSNH had even been in Londonderry. One reader commented, “…I have been driving around Londonderry (nothing else better to do) and I have not seen any PSNH vehicles. I did manage to get a hold of them yesterday and asked if they knew where Londonderry was. Neither one of us were amused at the time….”

PSNH was like a ghost in the night, leaving behind a few erected telephone poles throughout Londonderry as their evidence. Londonderry Hometown Online News asked readers to leave comments if they had, in fact, seen PSNH. One reader wrote, “We have seen crews on rt 102, Gilcrest, High Range rd and Stonehenge.” Another commented, “Late thurs night a line went down just within view of our windows and a crew was out there working (hovey rd) for almost two days. They left in the early morning hours of Sat. morning.”

The town residents were warned that they should avoid all wires and consider them active. They were also asked not to remove or cut tree limbs that were on top of or touching power lines. It was advised that they find alternative shelter, as the temperatures would drop dramatically come nightfall. Many roads were still impassible, due to the amount of trees down, and there was no estimate of when they would all be open again.

Thanks to those that have left comments on what they remember.  You will want to read the comments left during the storm!

If your interested those comments and reading the original stories from December 14 about the 2008 Ice Storm, follow these links:

119Thousand get Power Back 194 Thousand to go in New Hampshire Includes an update from Fire Chief Kevin MacCaffrie and PSNH. Click to discover what they were saying about the outages.

How Many Power Outage Work Crews are in Londonderry? Mentions the amount of crews working around the state and poses the question to residents, Have you seen any in Londonderry? Find out what comments the readers left.

The War of the Worlds, Ice Latest Update Lists road closures, both new and old, and includes a couple of comments from readers.

Expect Restoration to Slow for Southern New Hampshire and Londonderry An update from PSNH which includes the amount of customers with and without power. Click to find out which area of the state PSNH says was hit the hardest.