Trick-or-treating delayed amid cleanup after Northeast storm

Many of the vessels were unmanned and adrift while others were washed up on shore.In Massachusetts, a sewage treatment plant in North Andover lost power during the storm and spilled 8 million gallons of untreated waste into the Merrimack River, North Andover Town Manager Andrew Maylor said.Because of the power outage, a pump failed to move waste into the treatment plant, allowing the waste to back up and flow in the river, he said.There was no immediate threat to residents, and the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection was looking into the matter, he said.In Maine, U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin, a Republican, called for an investigation after the state’s only Veterans Administration hospital outside Augusta asked for emergency power during the storm.The Maine Emergency Management Agency had National Guard soldiers deliver a large backup generator on Monday.The director of the Togus VA said the facility never lost backup power and that the request for help was made as a precaution.In Vermont, dairy farmers who lost electricity in a wind storm that caused widespread outages across New England were relying on generators to power milking equipment to milk cows and to keep the milk cool. Vermont is the largest dairy producing state in New England, with about 800 dairy farms.The scope of the damage in Maine made comparisons to the ice storm inevitable. That storm wrecked the power delivery system in eastern Canada and New England, causing tens of millions of dollars in damage.Roger Pomerleau remembers the 1998 storm well. He said the cold temperatures made that storm harder on a lot of people, but this storm is the one that knocked out his power, which remained out Tuesday.“The temperature is in our favor right now. Those were cold temperatures back then,” he said. “Freezing temperatures. Sump pumps weren’t working, cellars were filling up with water. Very different now.”The weather this week is seasonable, with high temperatures in the 50s and 60s, though the low Wednesday morning was predicted to approach freezing.Associated Press writers Patrick Whittle in Portland, Maine; Marina Villeneuve in Augusta, Maine; Kathy McCormack and Mike Casey in Concord, New Hampshire; Jennifer McDermott in Providence, Rhode Island; and Mark Pratt in Boston contributed to this story. (Greensburg Daily News)