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WEST HAVEN - Floodwaters carved away portions of two beaches in town on Tuesday as thunderstorms inundated Connecticut with heavy rain, causing flooding in many communities.
West Haven Emergency Management Director Rick Fontana said there is an informal stream in the city that takes rainwater from two neighborhoods comprised of about 650 homes around Colonial Boulevard, as well as nearby hills, and flows toward Long Island Sound. He said that stream was inundated with water and debris, which clogged a drain pipe.
That caused the stream to overflow and become a raging river, Fontana said. The water flowed down Colonial Boulevard to Lake Street and ran to the beach. He said the water carved 4- 5-foot canyons through the beach on Lake Street, then overflowed and did the same to the beach on Seaview Avenue.
"That damage is unprecedented. I've been a resident just about all my life here…never saw impacts like that onto the next beach," he said.
Fontana said the city will work with outside contractors and the state Department of Energy and Environmental to repairs the beaches. Crews will be out this week to make the beaches safe, he said.
The storms brought heavy rainfall around the state Tuesday afternoon. In southwestern Connecticut, the National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning that alerted people's phones.
Early rainfall totals Wednesday morning reported up to 2.5 inches of rainfall in Middlefield, according to the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network, or CoCoRaHS.
The storms resulted in thousands of power outages in Connecticut, though as of Wednesday morning those had mostly been restored.
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