Trees down, power outages, flooding in Baldwin

As the hamlet of Baldwin wrestled free from the clutches of hurricane/tropical storm Irene this morning many residents were still experiencing flooding and intermittent power outages. Numerous trees were uprooted and scattered debris cluttered roadways making travel difficult if not impossible.

Although meteorologists downgraded Irene to tropical storm strength on Sunday morning powerful winds ravaged the area and flooding was prominent even as rains diminished. The Town of Hempstead and other officials cautioned against driving wherever possible and also reported power outages for as many as 300,000 residents. The town also said some 65 trees had fallen onto public roads with untold additional timber littered on private property.

The county executive, Ed Mangano, reported Sunday morning at 10 a.m. that there were 20 transmission lines down in the county and thousands of residents were being housed in emergency shelters.