Bridgewater, NJ entering the Third World?

Power was lost within this area of Bridgewater, NJ around 8pm on Monday, October 29, 2012 during the visit of Sandy to New Jersey. As of November 7, there has been no restoration of power, phone, etc. in this region and in fact the various downed lines have not even been removed.

One of those affected phoned JCP&L and was told the power loss had not been reported!

As a challenge to the reader/viewer, "how many" downed lines can you spot in the second picture (taken on Nov. 7)? No credit for the fallen and not replaced transformer. Note that the downed lines are on Garretson Road, which goes to the Bridgewater Municipal Building.

The Bridgewater Patch reported on November 5, 2012

Great Hills Road resident Jim, who declined to give his last name, said he is one of those JCP&L customers still without power. He contacted JCP&L customer service, but received no real answer.

"All they said was, 'I’m sorry' and 'We don’t have any information,' blaming it on their dispatch that provides updates," he said.

As of Sunday, there were 1,671 without power in Bridgewater.

JCP&L spokesman Ron Morano did not immediately return a call for comment.

As for PSE&G customers, the numbers have dwindled to between 2,001 and 5,000, the next step down in the company's scale.

The company, on its website, is now saying that all impacted customers should be restored by Nov. 9, although most are expected to have power before then.

Still, despite the wait, Bridgewater Township Mayor Dan Hayes said his main focus has been on the restoration of power for all residents. He said that more crews are being deployed from the power companies, and the number of them is increasing every day.

And now that the Bridgewater Senior Center has power again as of this morning, Hayes said, those in need are invited to stop by to pick up water or other supplies to get through this difficult time.

"Restoration is going as quickly as it can, although that's little comfort to people who are without power," he said. "That's the number one priority of the administration, and has all our attention."

"But we can never say it's going well as long as there are residents without power," he added.

One commenter to the Patch post suggested that JCP&L was not reporting accurate numbers for restoration:

JCP&L has its numbers messed up. Online this morning they said only 800 people in Bridgewater were still without power. They have ignored our area (Van Holten School) for the last three days because they had us listed as having power, we do not. Now they keep changing the dates for restoration.

We were told by JCP&L that they were taking care of the hardest his areas first. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but since we had a brief bit of power on Friday and then it went out again, doesn't that mean they had us in the loop four days ago? Hello? Buehler??

Another comment was somewhat humorous:

There was a brief bit of power Friday and it went out because some utility genius didn't bother to drive around the Van Holten neighborhood to see there is a transformer on the ground on Spring Valley Drive . The pole snapped in half. When the power was turned on Friday the transformer caught fire. Since then no one has even looked at this mess. Would be nice to have power back along with running water before this next storm hits.

**On 7 November 2012, Governor Christie noted

"We may take a setback in the next 24 hours," he said this afternoon. "You need to be prepared for that."

He said 11,000 workers have been trying to restore power to the 369,000 households still without electricity, but they may – by OSHA regulations over linemen in bucket trucks — have to halt operations if winds from the nor’easter reach or exceed 40 mph.

UPDATE: Power restored to this area on 7 Nov 2012 between 4pm and 5pm. Snow arising from the nor'easter started around 11:25am and has continued through the day.