Storm Not As Bad As Could Have Been In Briarcliff

OSSINING, N.Y. – Tropical Storm Irene caused some flooding, road closures and power outages in Ossining and Briarcliff, but overall, the amount of damage was relatively little, officials said.

"We've seen a lot worse storms than this," said Briarcliff Sgt. Michael Bassett.

In Briarcliff, Route 9A was closed in both directions north of North State Road due to flooding, as was Pleasantville Road from Route 9A through the Taconic Parkway and North State Road between Route 9A and Pleasantville Road.

Several areas were without electricity, including the Rosecliff community off of Long Hill Road and an area north of North State Road near Route 9A, Bassett said.

"Con Ed is working on it. They were not able to give an estimate as to when power would be restored," Bassett said.

In Ossining, 22 houses lost power, said village Mayor William Hanauer, a small number out of the 43,000 homes countywide that lost power.

"We're very lucky. I think we escaped the brunt of the storm," the mayor said.

While a few trees fell down, and there were a lot of twigs, branches and acorns blowing around in the street, no live wires were downed, Hanauer said.

Down by the waterfront, the Metro North train tracks flooded so much that it looked like a river, and the Boathouse restaurant took on about four feet of water, enough to cover up half of the building's windows.

The Briarcliff Woods condominiums, which experienced major flooding during two storms in June, stayed dry except for one unit that has a foundation issue, said Brian Streb, the president of the condominium association.

"Thank God this rain storm was a lot smaller of an event than was originally predicted. The winds were pretty strong, but I'd say not as strong as in some of those last floods we had," Streb said. "The good news is that the water coming off of Cedar Lane wasn't as catastrophic as one might have thought."

Route 9 by the Arcadian Shopping Center, between Revolutionary Road and Rockledge Avenue, was flooded with knee-deep water during the night. Several cars that attempted to pass through the water stalled there, Hanauer said.

But by early Sunday afternoon, that portion of Route 9 was open again.

"I am very glad that our emergency operations team was totally prepared for this and that everything went well. All the preparations led to activities and actions going as they were supposed to," Hanauer said.

Extra police who had been called to work from Saturday night to Sunday morning were sent home Sunday morning, Hanauer said, bringing police work rotations back to normal.

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