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Rain remains but Sandy blows over; St. Lawrence County sets up emergency shelter, SUNY Potsdam loses power, Cape Air cancels flights

Posted 10/30/12

It looks like Halloween will not be washed out in St. Lawrence County. Hurricane Sandy's fury seems to have avoided the North Country after lashing the region with high winds and some rain. The North …

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Rain remains but Sandy blows over; St. Lawrence County sets up emergency shelter, SUNY Potsdam loses power, Cape Air cancels flights

Posted

It looks like Halloween will not be washed out in St. Lawrence County.

Hurricane Sandy's fury seems to have avoided the North Country after lashing the region with high winds and some rain.

The North Country was spared the worst of the storm, with neither extremely damaging winds or very heavy rain and flooding materializing.

There was a three-hour power interruption at SUNY Potsdam as well as nearby areas, from about 7 to 10 p.m. Monday, officials reported.

However, this morning, National Grid's emergency web site indicates just nine customers in Potsdam are without power and there are two outages near Cranberry Lake. Neither one has a restoration time posted.

The county had its emergency operations center up and running yesterday to coordinate any required emergency responses. Emergency shelter was arranged at six locations around the county and, if needed, the Operations Center would ask Red Cross to activate them. NYSARC stationed buses around the county to provide transportation.

Cape Air cancelled flights from Massena and Ogdensburg through today.

Highway crews were on alert to clear the roads if necessary. Residents were encouraged to minimize unnecessary travel when the storm began.

County offices closed at 2 p.m. yesterday, but will open as normal today.

Monday, a number of municipalities throughout the county declared states of emergency in the face of the powerful storm’s approach, Canton-Potsdam Hospital closed its non-essential services at 2 p.m., lots of events were cancelled, schools closed early.

Several school districts today are delating opening, including Ogdensburg, Massena, and Gouverneur.

The aftermath of Hurricane Sandy is still with us and will remain for several days, as east winds today will be at 20 mph with gusts perhaps as high as 40 mph, and the threat of rain will continue for several days. The chance of precipitation does not drop below 50 percent until Friday.