WEST SPRINGFIELD –  Tropical storm Isaias swept through the region on the evening of Tuesday, Aug. 4. With the storm brought wind gusts that toppled trees and telephone poles which caused damage to buildings, roads and even homes.

Nearly every community in Western Mass. was impacted by the storm, including West Springfield. Mayor William Reichelt gave an update the morning following the storm and said at about 7:45 a.m. on Aug. 4 there were still about 28,000 residents without power. However, a day later on the morning of Aug. 5, the number had dwindled down to 1,108 in West Springfield. Reichelt said across Western Massachusetts on Aug. 5, there were still around 8,900 people without power.

In a video update on his Facebook regarding the power outages and damage later in the day on Aug. 5 At the time of the update, he said there were still around 950 residents without power.

He said he felt that “was far too many in town” without power. Reichelt said the majority of outages were located in the area of Tatham Elementary School, including “both sides or Route 20 around Tatham.”

Reichelt explained that he had recently spoken with a representative from Eversource, who said power would be restored by midnight on Thursday. He urged those without power to reach out to him so he could “continue to harass Eversource.”

He said while he was working hard to ensure power was restored, he had little to no authority regarding the power. “It’s not under me, it’s all under Eversource. They own the poles, they don’t allow us to do any tree work around the wires,” he said.

However, Reichelt praised West Springfield crews that had been working diligently to do what they could to assist with storm cleanup. “Our crews have been fantastic at getting trees cleared to the roads and picking up all the tree debris that are on the tree belt, and they’ll be doing that for the next couple of weeks - probably into September,” he said.

Reichelt said he wasn’t sure “what the delay is,” but his focus was on “getting power back.” He said he would “worry about the why’s, the what ifs, the blame” after power was restored to town. He said he “completely understood the frustration” residents had after days without power, but promised to continue to update residents.

In an update later in the day he said Eversource, he had said they would restore power by Thursday night, was unable to do that. He said, “They’ve been pulled to address emergency issues in other areas and pandemic travel restrictions prevent southerners crews from assisting. We still have over 600 homes without power after two full days of work!”

By Saturday morning the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) reported that power had been restored to the entirety of town.

In an email statement, Eversource senior vice president and COO, Penni McLean-Connor thanked customers for their patience and reported that more than 76,000 had lost power during the storm. “Trees were toppled, buildings were damaged and the electrical network was hard-hit. We worked to repair over 240 broken poles, helped open 245 blocked roads and cleared almost 950 trees,” she said.

“We thank you for your patience with reporting outages early in the storm response, when our self-service systems struggled to handle a surge in volume. We worked hard to rapidly correct the problems and stabilize these systems,” McLean-Connor said. “We are committed to providing our customers with top-tier service.”