CRANFORDLIFE UNIONNEWSDAILY.COM
OCTOBER 2021
VOL. 06 NO. 02
Girl Scouts Remnants of Hurricane Ida ravage Cranford are honored
— See Page 3
A community that cares
— See Page 6
Cougars win in overtime
— See Page 13
By EmilyAnn Jackman Staff Writer The remnants of Hurricane Ida swept into New Jersey on Wednesday, Sept. 1, and left many in Cranford with flooded homes. New Jersey reported 27 deaths, more than any of the other nine states affected by Ida. Following the heavy rain, tornadoes, rising waters, power outages and abandoned vehicles in a number of towns, the state has started the necessary cleanup. “Please don’t be fooled by today’s good weather,” Union County Board of Commissioners Chairperson Alexander Mirabella said in a press release on Thursday, Sept. 2. “Emergency workers are still engaged in recovery operations from yesterday’s destructive storm. We ask everyone to help out by keeping the roads clear and keeping an eye out for hazardous conditions.” In a Sept. 2 release, PSE&G reported that approximately 20,000 of its 2.3 million electric customers were without service where the majority of outages were, specifically in Essex, Bergen, Somerset, Union, Mercer and Gloucester counties. The Rahway River overflowed into communities in both Rahway and Cranford, forcing mayors in both municipalities to address the damage. “The severe flooding was mostly involving the river, but we’ve seen flood elevation in parts of Rahway we haven’t seen before,” Rahway Mayor Ray Giacobbe said on Thursday, Sept. 2. “This was an anomaly storm that dumped a bunch of water in one area in a very quick time. The city of Rahway continues to work with our engineering department and also with the Mayors Council and the Rahway River Watershed Association, which is a regional group of mayors. We’ve been working with engineers and trying to address Congress on ways to address the flooding issue from a regional matter. “I’ve been working with Dan Aschenbach (the former Cranford mayor, who heads the Mayors Council Rahway River
Photo Courtesy of Gov. Phil Murphy
In the wake of the remants of Hurricane Ida that swept through New Jersey on Wednesday, Sept. 1, Gov. Phil Murphy shakes a homeowner’s hand as he visits Cranford to offer his moral support and the promise of funds and assistance from FEMA. Watershed Flood Control) in Cranford, and we continue to try to address this issue, but, of course, it’s a larger regional issue, which also costs money, which we need funding from the federal government,” he continued. “Talking to our congressman and our senators to try to address the situation and find out how we can attack this regionally and come to a consensus of the money spent, it’s a very hefty process, and we’ve been at it for some years now.” A gas leak caused a house to explode on River Road in Rahway; luckily, the home’s inhabitants were able to get out before the blast. Unable to comment, Giacobbe said the city will take care of the family. Flash floods happened in a lot of the towns, said Cranford Mayor Kathleen Prunty on Thursday, Sept. 2.
“We just had a lot of rain dumped on us very fast — streets that aren’t typically flooded streets at all did have a lot of water, because it all came so quickly,” Prunty said. “Those flash floods flooded a number of streets and caused a lot of people who were on the road to be caught in the water, and we had more than 100 cars that were disabled and abandoned. They’re still removing some of them, which was an all-day effort. That was the first part. “Then, as the volume in the Rahway River increases, we have river flooding,” Prunty added. “That flooding is in the area that is typically the flood zone. It was two different situations, which were both devastating to people.” Prunty confirmed that more than 200 See RESIDENTS, Page 2
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