BANGOR, Maine — As utility crews continued to work Tuesday to restore electricity to the thousands of customers still in the dark after Sunday’s snowstorm, police reported that a Washington County woman died Sunday in a storm-related accident.
Danielle Moores, 28, of Trescott died when the pickup truck she was driving on Route 189 went off the road about 6:30 p.m., Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Maine State Police, said Tuesday in a news release.
Moores died when her truck overturned and came to rest on its roof in a bog, he said.
As of 11 p.m. Tuesday, about 15,000 Emera Maine customers remained without power, according to the company — down from about 58,000 at the peak of the outages. Central Maine Power’s website reported about 19,600 customers remained without power.
Emera Maine crews have encountered significant storm damage, including downed wires and trees. The damage is slowing restoration efforts, according to the statement.
Emera asked customers to ensure driveways and side streets are plowed and sanded to allow crews to perform restoration efforts and to use the company’s online reporting form because of busy phone lines.
Only 11 households in Washington County were still without power at 4 p.m. Emera customers without electricity in northern Penobscot and Piscataquis County should receive power back by the end of the day Wednesday, according to the utility. Customers in other parts of Penobscot and Hancock counties are expected to have service restored by the end of the day Thursday.
With voters throughout the state traveling to the polls, Gov. Paul LePage signed an emergency proclamation allowing utility workers in northern and eastern Maine to vote from remote locations. The set-up is similar to that used by overseas U.S. citizens and military personnel.
In Waldo County, where nearly 21 percent of Central Maine Power customers remained without power at 10:58 p.m. Tuesday, residents got creative. Some were melting snow on their wood stoves in order to bathe and flush toilets, and some were packing their freezers with snow in an effort to keep meat and garden vegetables from thawing.
Judy Berk and David Foley of Northport, who have indelible memories of last Christmas’ ice storm and subsequent five-days-long power outage, said their power went out during the storm on Sunday morning. The couple had a fire in the woodstove and were getting ready for a candlelit dinner on Tuesday, but nonetheless said they were feeling very ready for the lights to go back on.
“This is so early in the season,” Berk said. “Normally we have lots of batteries, lots of supplies. But this really caught us unawares.”
Foley said he has learned something — it only takes a gallon of water warmed on the woodstove to shower by ladling the water over his head.
“It’s surprising how little water you need,” he said. “I got good and clean today.”
Waldo County poll workers also moved voting around in some communities without power on Election Day. In Searsport, because there was no electricity at Town Hall, voters moved next door to the public safety building, which was lit with the help of a generator.
One thing that Waldo County residents did not do on Monday night was use the emergency shelter at Camden Hills Regional High School in Rockport, according to Dale Rowley, director of the Waldo County Emergency Management Agency. Just two people came from Knox County but none from Waldo, he said.
“We had some calls — where’s your shelter, where’s your shelter?” Rowley, sounding mildly frustrated, said Tuesday. “We set one up and nobody shows up.”
Nevertheless, the shelter would stay open on Tuesday night, in case anyone needed it.
Watch bangordailynews.com for updates.
