Business & Tech

LIPA Finishes Irene Restoration as New Rain Brings More Outages

More than 3,000 lose power with new rain.

The Long Island Power Authority wrapped up its major hurricane restoration job over the weekend and began a fresh new work week dealing with more power outages.

The last of the 523,000 customers who lost power because of hurricane Irene had their juice turned back on sometime Monday, according to LIPA spokesman Mark Gross. But heavy rains moved into the area causing new outages.

"Whenever a storm like this comes through with gusty winds and rain, you have outages," Gross said.  

Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.

He added that the already saturated ground is causing more trees to topple onto wires.

As of 2 p.m. Tuesday, LIPA was showing about 370 outages affecting more than 3,000 customers.

Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.

The utility spokesman said the outages were scattered throughout Long Island, and there were no noteworthy trouble spots.

Despite having to complete a major restoration project this past week, Gross says LIPA has crews and on-island contractors at the ready for what this current storm will bring.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here