Storm Stories: Neighbors help Neighbors Clean Up After Storm

People on Willow Road and Silas Deane Highway spent Sunday afternoon and Monday morning clearing debris and fixing their homes after Hurricane Irene.

Winds from the storm caused a tree limb to slam into power lines and damaged a home on Willow Street. The tree limb damaged Franc Henri girlfriend’s home.

The tree branch had came down on power lines and pulled the wires down along with siding and trim on the home, Henri said.

Henri heard the tree branch fall around 7 a.m. Sunday while he was in his backyard assessing damage from the storm. He ran to his girlfriend’s house after hearing loud rumble where he found the down tree branch.

The intersection was "totally blocked with trees," he said. Henri added the storm damage was made worse when a car tried driving through the down wires a half hour later and tore down more siding. He estimates a 10 by 10 section of siding came down.

In the course of the repairs to the house, Henri has not found any water damage.

"I was surprised the wind didn't get behind the siding and take more off," Henri said. He added once the damaged siding and trim is fixed, "it will look better than it did before the storm."

Walt Sykes, a Public Works employee, stopped by Monday morning to see if the limb belonged to one of the town's trees. However the town was not responsible for cleaning up the limb because the tree has to be on the property line to be a town tree.

Karen Tuck swept up the mess left by the falling tree limb even though the tree was not on her property.

Tuck’s home suffered no damage and her trees lost some limbs, but it was "nothing serious."

The owner of Ravi Sam’s Food Store, Basant Sabkatoa, was driving down Main Street Sunday afternoon when he noticed a tree branch had destroyed a power line in his parking lot. So, he called one of his friends to help him chop up the branch.

The unidentified man promptly cut the branch into several small pieces, which Sabkatoa will sell as firewood in his store this winter.

Sabkatoa said that Sam’s corporation is expected to pay for the damage caused by the tree branch.

“There’s nothing you can do with a natural disaster,” Sabkatoa said.

Ravi Sam’s Food Store was open for business as usual Monday morning.