Pumps were brought in to siphon out the water. Then air machines dried out the water logged crawl space.

Approximately 140 yards of debris was swept into the crawl space area after Hurricane Sandy. That debris had to be cleaned out before district officials and engineers could assess the damage, Milano said.

“We had to clean the entire crawl space and level the entire crawl space,” said Milano, adding that this was accomplished with district maintenance crews working triple shifts everyday after school and through the holiday break the past two months after the Oct. 29 storm.

On one wall in the high school boiler room the water line is nearly four-feet high and a water line can be seen on one of the two boilers that is still working. Another boiler is inoperable. The district has a portable boiler connected to the building from outside.

Work will be done in phases with crews working “24/7” Milano said, installing the wiring and the switchgears, which are a combination of electrical disconnect switches, fuses or circuit breakers used to control and protect electrical equipment.

According to Milano, getting switchgears typically takes 12 weeks, but the district got a commitment to get them in half the time. “The plan includes rewiring the crawl space and equipment that is rated to be submerged in saltwater to mitigate future problems,” he said.