CHESTER (WWLP) – Chester residents in the dark Saturday night.
Jill Moretz, the general manager of Chester Electric, said nearly the entire town lost power around 4 p.m. Saturday.
Eversource spokesman Mitch Gross said a tree fell on Route 20 on the Beckett/Chester town line.
Twenty-seven customers were without power in Beckett, while nearly the entire town of Chester, or over 1,300 people, were in the dark.
Power was restored around midnight Sunday.
Blue Note Café on the other end of Route 20 in Chester also had no power until approximately 11:30 p.m. They did not close their doors though.
According to manager Jamie Bird, the power goes out at least half a dozen times normally during the winter. “Everybody’s used to the power being out, so we had a good time,” he said.
Saturday night, they lit candles and used battery-powered lanterns. They also “broke out some acoustic guitars, and listened to the battery-powered boom box for a while,” Bird said.
“We’ve done it multiple times,” he said. “We had a good crowd.”
They did not have the television going though. Speaking about the Patriot’s playoff game, Blue Note employee Jean Deveno said, “A lot of people suffered through and couldn’t watch it.” However, she said because there have been so many times when Chester is without power for days, some residents have generators.
“Some people have them hard-wired right into their homes,” Deveno said, adding that others “have the small generators that can run your TV box and a little heater.”
She said residents without generators who were determined to watch the game had to drive out of town, unless they had their pellet and wood stoves going. “You can’t leave them,” Deveno said. “A lot of people were very disappointed.”
“We are fortunate in downtown Chester to have great water pressure from a gravity-fed system, so no water pumps are needed,” said Chester resident Michele Kenney, the newly-elected president of the Jacobs Ladder Business Association. “I cook with gas, and heat water with gas (propane), and my primary heat is wood. Just add candlelight, and I have a peaceful night at home.”
“Losing power from a downed tree in Becket is not uncommon for Chester residents,” Kenney added. “I’m just glad it was an easy-to-find tree!”
