New Englanders woke up to soaked streets and dark houses early Tuesday after a fast-moving wind and rain storm barreled through overnight, knocking out electricity to tens of thousands of homes and businesses. The outages stretch from coastal Massachusetts up through Maine and into Vermont, with some communities still without power this morning. Emergency responders and public works crews are urging people to steer clear of flooded roads and to assume any downed wires are live. Local utilities have spun up their outage centers and say they will post restoration estimates as they finish assessing damage.
Where power is out
According to data from PowerOutage.com, more than 130,000 customers across New England were without electricity early Tuesday. The live tracker showed roughly 64,469 customers out in Massachusetts, about 34,154 in Connecticut, 15,391 in Rhode Island, 17,695 in Maine and 1,362 in Vermont.
Local reports and damage
Local coverage reports that heavy wind and rain moved through overnight, and that saturated ground combined with strong gusts to knock down trees around the region. As reported by NBC Boston, roughly 64,000 customers in Massachusetts and tens of thousands more in neighboring states were left in the dark.
Hardest-hit pockets
In Massachusetts, Middlesex and Worcester counties were showing the largest clusters of outages, and parts of Cape Cod and the Islands reported particularly high percentages of customers without electricity. According to the state-specific tracker on PowerOutage.com, National Grid accounted for the largest single share of current outages across Massachusetts.
How to stay safe
The American Red Cross is reminding residents to avoid downed power lines entirely, to use battery-powered flashlights or lanterns instead of candles, and to unplug sensitive electronics to prevent surge damage when the power comes back. For a full checklist covering medical-device backup plans, food safety during an outage and safe generator use, see guidance from the American Red Cross.
Where to get updates
Officials urge residents to report outages directly to their utility and to keep an eye on local emergency alerts for information on road closures and any available shelters. Utilities publish live restoration estimates on their outage pages, such as National Grid's interactive outage map, available at National Grid's Outage Map, which lists estimated restoration times for affected towns.
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