Politics & Government
Report: CL&P Grossly Unprepared For Storm
A national report on CL&P's response to storm on October 29 says utility company was unprepared.
A special report released by a national emergency-preparedness consultant on Friday states that . was severely unprepared for the Oct. 29 snowstorm that paralyzed Connecticut. More that 800, 000 of it's customers were without power for up to 10 days.
According to Witt Associates of Washington D.C., "CL&P was not prepared for an event of this size. The worst-case scenario in the company's emergency response plan considered outages over 100,000 customers, or less than 10 percent of their total customer base. More than two-thirds of its customers lost power as a result of the October snowstorm," the report stated.
The Hartford Courant reports that recruited the firm, which is led by former Federal Emergency Management Administrator James Lee Witt to assess the utility company's performance and its problems in responding to the storm. The firm did the investigation and report free of charge.
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"It should come as no surprise to anyone that CL&P was completely unprepared for a storm of this magnitude,'' Malloy said during a Friday morning briefing in Hartford with Charles Fisher, Witt Associates vice president. "But," Malloy added, "the extent to which they were unprepared is troubling."
dealt with CL&P through tropical storm Irene last August and the winter storm in October. He grew frustrated with the utility company and how they dealt with the public.
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"You can't manage through press releases," Moccia told Patch earlier this month. "You have to have people on the ground here and you can't tell people they are not a priority because they live down some sidestreet. Back in August, everybody knew the storm was coming and they brought crews in from Seattle a week after it happened. I gave them a little more leeway in October because of the snow on branches forced trees to snap, but it still wasn't good enough."
CL&P made wholesale changes in their emergency management team and accepted the resignation of on November 17. Meanwhile, Malloy set a Jan. 2 deadline for the state Department of Emergency Service and Public Protection to lay out a "process" to create a master plan for future storms.
"We have a long winter ahead of us and this report is the first step toward making sure we are ready for whatever Mother Nature throws at us," Malloy said. "We will in fact learn from this storm."
