Updated: Some South Orange Residents Told No Power Until 11/15

Updated: Friday 5:30 p.m.   PSE&G says down to 2100 SO households without power. 

Again, please post your neighborhood if power has returned.

Updated 2:30 p.m.:  South Orange residents have told Patch that they are now hearing 11/15 as an estimate for power restoration by PSE&G. The date was, first, 11/5 then 11/9. 

PSE&G reports, and the Village issued a statement saying that nearly half of those without power have had it restored. Some residents are skeptical.

From the Village: As of Wednesday afternoon, PSE&G reported that there were now between 2,000 and 3,000 households are without power in South Orange, down from 4,700 at the finish of Hurricane Sandy's major impact Tuesday morning, which was approximately 90% of the households in South Orange.

At the same time, numerous residents -- nearly 100 -- have told Patch that they don't have power restored, nor have they seen trucks.

The Village released noted: 

Many PSE&G crews have been through South Orange, with many more working at the substation and distributer level, repairs to which will positively impact power restoration in South Orange, though the work on those is done outside of town so will go largely unseen.

Some comments from residents posted on Patch or via South Orange Patch Facebook include: 

"I don't know of a single person in South Orange whose power has been restored..."

"It makes sense that business areas and larger roads get it restored first. I also do not know anyone who has had their power restored."

"No one I know has had power returned. Woman just told me she LOST power last night after having it all along."

"Me too. I know NO ONE who got power back."

"If that is accurate - great news. However, I find that percentage incredibly hard to believe."

More from the Village:

Village Officials have participated in daily conference calls with PSE&G representatives, in addition to numerous individual calls and emails, to monitor the status of PSE&G's efforts to restore power and aggressively advocate for our residents. PSE&G has reported that Tuesday afternoon, after the hazardous conditions had subsided, were devoted to damage assessment for use in planning the restoration effort.  Immediately thereafter, repair and restoration efforts commenced.  According to PSE&G, the first focus was on critical facilities such as hospitals, emergency services facilities and nursing homes.  At the same time, crews began the repair process at the substation level and are branching out along the grid into neighborhoods, working from larger primary lines down to smaller individual services lines. 

South Orange's power situation is unique with power lines running through backyards. On one hand, it enables our public works crews to open streets sooner (only a few streets in South Orange are still blocked off, out of the nearly 75-100 that were blocked originally). 

As reflected in the PSE&G statement below, PSE&G is not able to commit to a specific town by town, neighborhood by neighborhood restoration timetable, at least at this time. PSE&G reports that they have crews working around the clock to restore as much power to as many people as quickly as possible.  The latest PSE&G projection is that the majority of households won't be back until the end of the weekend, at the very earliest. We have been communicating with county and state officials to ensure that we get as accurate and up to date information as possible from PSE&G on the progress of power restoration in South Orange.

Village officials will continue to monitor PSE&G progress and efforts while advocating for the restoration of South Orange power as soon as possible. Additionally, Village officials have been in close contact with the Essex County Office of Emergency Management to help expedite service to critical facilities supporting South Orange infrastructure, such as schools (Not just for school purposes, but also for polling stations on election day), and power to refueling pumps for our emergency vehicles. The Village Department of Public Works has completed all possible tree and debris removal to assist in that effort, and is awaiting PSE&G's crews as several locations to finish that process.

We will continue to update the community as we get more information.

Have you had power restored? If so, please post your neighborhood in the comments or on SO Facebook.