In Dartmouth, a firetruck was trapped on the roadway for much of the early morning.
Fire chief Richard Arruda said crews were responding to a series of transformer fires and downed trees, when one engine hit a snag.
“We had a fire truck that went out on a fire,” he said. “A wire was burning in the roadway. While the truck was waiting, a tree fell down on the other side of the roadway, so the truck was trapped on the roadway for four hours during the height of the storm, which was kind of dangerous for the crew that was working out there.”
The truck was freed around 8am, when Eversource de-energized the burning wire.
Arruda reported no storm-related injuries in Dartmouth.
---
Sandwich resident Michael Pottey and his wife have lived full-time on Salt Marsh Road since the 1980s. He said that last night, listening to the storm outside their beachfront home, was a scary experience.
“With the high wind, the house was shaking pretty violently, and I had water driving in around the windowpanes, which has never happened to me before in this house,” he said. “And the way the surf came right up, we probably lost another eight-to-ten feet of beach.”
The house is built on wooden pilings, and Pottey added, "when it’s blowing 80 or 90 miles per hour like that, the house moves.”
The waves and wind were so powerful, he said, he was worried for his family's safety.
"There was a lot of wind, and the salt was being blown into the power lines causing them to arc across the insulators and spark, because of the salt being conductive," he said. "So it was pretty scary.”
In Marion, at least three trees were uprooted at Tabor Academy.
But along the South Coast the nor’easter spared the waterfront much of the damage that hurricanes have brought over the years.
Cheryl Souza, a manager at Barden’s Boat Yard in Marion, says vessels fared relatively well, both on the moorings and at the docks.
“We were really lucky with minimal damage, as far as the wind being a lot more than predicted and steady versus gusting,” she said. “It's a little bit more of a storm than some, but not as bad as others.”
She added, “We always seem to get a nor'easter at the end of October.”
Business and school closures give the day a different feel
Schools across the Cape closed for the day, because of the lack of power, and because of safety concerns with downed trees and blocked roadways.
With children out of school, some families spent the day together. Hyannis dad Luciano Carvalhis said many restaurants near his home were closed without electricity, so he brought his children out to Dennis to eat.
“Can't complain too much,” he said. “It's part of life, I guess. Got to deal with it.”
After lunch, they were headed into Stop & Shop to buy ice cream. And for dinner? He said he hoped the power would be back on soon.
Ron Mantley of Brewster, a culinary teacher retired from Cape Cod Tech, stayed home from his two retirement jobs, as sous chef and candy maker.
“They said, ‘Don't come in,’” he said. “A lot of people couldn't get out. And my wife, one of her coworkers couldn't get her car out because she has an electric garage door opener, so she couldn’t get her car out in order to go to work.
Mantley said the storm reminded him of a major hurricane.
“There was a very large tree on the corner of Millstone and 137. The trunk must be twice as wide as me, and that just went totally over. So the damage is very extensive.”
Mantley had no electricity at home, but he did have a generator with enough power to run the microwave and toaster oven.
The chef said he planned to spend some time cooking up food from the refrigerator that he didn’t want to go bad.
——
Noah Shenk of Truro had a short work day because of the storm and spent part of the afternoon traveling up the Cape to visit his mom.
“I was supposed to go to work today,” he explained with a smile. “But I ended up just checking job sites to make sure that nothing blew away, and then going home. We had to make sure that the roofs didn't blow off. Thank God they didn't, because then I'd be out in the storm.”
The mail must go through
But not everybody on the Cape stayed home from work.
Mail carriers navigated flooded streets, downed power lines, and road closures to deliver their routes.
Julie Hennessy has worked for the US Postal Service in Hyannis for more than 30 years. Today she braved flooded streets and downed power lines.
“Mail must go through, so I’m out here delivering packages,” she said. “I have my long raincoat on and my big hood up. Hopefully the power will come back on, because the power’s not on at the post office, so they can’t even mail things out.”
To navigate her route, Hennessy suited up in USPS raingear and cranked up the heat inside her mail truck.
“A lot of trees down, power lines down,” she said. “No Dunkin’ Donuts are open, either, which is a bummer! You just have to be careful going around the puddles and not splash people.”
CAI reporters Daniel Ackerman, Eve Zuckoff, Patrick Flanary, and Jennette Barnes all contributed to this this story.
