Fairfield Underwater After Elsa Drops 5 Inches

FAIRFIELD, CT — Public works crews were busy Friday in Fairfield as Tropical Storm Elsa blew through town.

Fairfield received about 5 inches of rain in 18 hours, according to Acting Director of Public Works John Marsilio, who said his department had been busy since 5 a.m., assisting with flooded cars and yards, and backed up catch basins.

“There’s quite a long list of people who are distressed,” Marsilio said, adding the Rooster River, South Pine Creek Road and brooks in Greenfield Hill all saw flooding. “Even downtown Fairfield had some issues.”

Power had to be shut off at the Bob’s Stores location in the 800 block of Post Road after the foundation flooded, according to Marsilio. Police announced Friday morning that several Fairfield streets and underpasses were closed due to flooding.

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“It’s just the effects of 5 inches of rain in a very short period of time on top of a saturated ground that wasn’t able to absorb any,” Marsilio said. “As bad as it was, it could have been an awful lot worse.”

There were no major issues with downed trees, according to Marsilio, who noted Fairfield saw only one outage event during Elsa. As of about 12:45 p.m., 190 Fairfield customers of United Illuminating Co. — or less than 1 percent — were without power, according to the company’s outage map. All except three customers had their power restored by 1:30 p.m.

“The wind portion of the storm was absent in Fairfield, which was a very, very lucky thing for us,” Marsilio said. “The impact to the urban forest was minimal.”

Additional rainfall is expected Friday in Fairfield, with showers and thunderstorms likely overnight, and more rain forecast for the weekend, according to the National Weather Service.

“The worst is over,” Marsilio said. “It’s only going to get better from hereon out.”