Hurricane Irene passed through Stony Brook University early on Sunday morning and left little more than a mess in its wake.
Several trees and large branches came crashing down in the morning hours, including one large tree outside of Kelly Quad and another by a parking lot behind West Apartment G. Branches near the Student Activities Center and Roth Quad also fell, though none appeared to cause any damage to buildings, cars or other property.
“We’ve looked at the infrastructure of the campus, and we’ve had some minor trees damaged, but really not a lot else,” said University Chief of Police Robert Lenahan on Sunday afternoon.
According to Lenahan, the university never had to rely on generators last night. Several people on Twitter said that the surrounding community was not so lucky, and several large trees appeared to have knocked out power lines.
Governor Cuomo has been sending out frequent updates about power outages across the state. The latest, sent out at 1:00pm, says that over 900,000 New Yorkers are without power, more than half of them on Long Island.
In Roth Quad, the pond was much higher than normal at 9:00 am this morning. The path between Roth and the Student Activities Center was littered with twigs and small branches, and nearby a large branch nearly crushed a black Jeep parked in the pay lot next to the SAC.
In West, some siding off of the roof of West Apartment B was torn off and thrown about 100 feet, coming to rest in the parking lot. The woods behind West G also had several large branches fall, none near any parked cars or nearby machinery.
At Kelly, the large tree that was split at its base is being removed by University Police, according to Lenahan.
The biggest issue that the university police is currently monitoring is the powerless traffic lights on Nicolls Road by the main and south entrances to campus. Those are under the jurisdiction of Suffolk County, but university police have been deployed to ensure traffic is moving safely though the area. Because those lights also serve Stony Brook University Medical Center, a Level 1 trauma center, Chief Lenahan says that LIPA should give the area priority.
“We anticipate the power to be back on in time for the 3 o’clock rush,” he said.
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