Picking up the pieces

Tuxedo continues with flood recovery work TUXEDO — Tuxedo’s East Village Bridge was put back into service on Tuesday afternoon, offering a lifeline to the approximately 300 residents in the 103 homes who were stranded in their section of town by flood waters earlier in the week as a result of the storm known as Irene. The bridge’s interim restoration is the beginning of what Tuxedo Supervisor Peter Dolan vowed will the town’s eventual return to normalcy after the Arden Dam was reportedly breached as Irene dumped almost 12 inches of rain on the area. It’s not going to be quick though, as the historical flooding is the worst ever seen in the town, according to Dolan. “I’ve never seen it like this,” he said. “It’s very bad. We are committed to bringing this town back to the state it was before the flood. We’re not going to desert anyone.” With virtually every part of Tuxedo affected by flood waters - though by far the East Village area had the greatest amount of destruction - emergency responders have been working night and day to help residents begin to recover and rebuild. Since Tuesday, members of the National Guard have joined in the effort. Until the crash gate allowing East Village residents to access the northbound lane of the New York State Thruway could be opened, residents had no way of leaving the area. Officials initially closed the road from Albany to Nyack because of flooding. The Thruway is now open. All power was expected to be restored by Thursday, said Dolan. The town is providing water to residents and delivering dumpsters so destroyed property can be taken away. Town equipment is being used in those efforts. “You name it and we’re doing it,” Dolan said, noting after the county said it could not immediately make repairs to make the bridge drivable, and the town took over that project and had the work completed in five hours. “It’s not fixed but it’s drivable,” Dolan added. What will take longer is the restoration of the Port Jervis line of the Metro North Railroad, with track damage never before seen in the Tuxedo/Sloatsburg areas. Flood waters have receded from the Harriman and Tuxedo train stations, but railroad officials said the Port Jervis line is suspended indefinitely as engineers continue inspections to ascertain the extent of damage. Shuttle buses will ferry commuters to Ramsey, N.J. to make the connection to the trains. (See related story on page 24. ) Like his colleague supervisors in Monroe and Woodbury, Dolan had nothing but praise for the town’s first-responders. “I can’t say enough about the efforts of the volunteer and paid staff,” he added. “I think I’ve cried at least five times because of them. When I think about what they’ve done, everyone had been great.” Heating oil leak But heightening anxiety for many has been the devastation of SOS Fuels, based in Tuxedo. As flood waters bombarded the area, company co-owner Jeffrey Spiegel said a pipe broke on one of its heating oil tanks, causing an unknown amount of home heating oil to leak out and into the Ramapo River. Spiegel said on Wednesday afternoon that he had no estimate of how many gallons leaked, as the computerized system which measures the oil was destroyed in the raging waters. He estimated “several thousand gallons,” but added, “we just don’t know.” Spiegel said he knows the situation has alarmed local residents and that it may have looked extremely bad because of videos and photos of its tanker trucks floating in the flood waters. Spiegel relayed the course of events as follows: The company’s severe weather plan of relocating trucks to higher ground off the flood plain was put in place as the onset of the storm. SOS’s truck relocation protocol is based on prior flooding knowledge, with Spiegel noting SOS has dealt with many storms, including one in 1985 that’s considered one of the biggest prior to Irene. Additionally, he said, beyond moving their trucks to high ground, employees surrounded the smaller empty storage tanks with concrete construction blocks, but they offered little resistance against the fast moving floodwaters. The unexpected What was unanticipated was the failure of the Arden Dam, which immediately created a catastrophic water problem. Once the dam broke, he said, all trucks were submerged. Heating oil delivery trucks, which were loaded with home heating oil for Monday deliveries, remained in place with no leakage. In a statement to The Photo News on Wednesday night, Spiegel added: “Our tanker trucks were parked on the site during the storm, but their tanks were completely empty because they had already made their deliveries of diesel fuel and gasoline by Saturday afternoon, the day before the flood. Because they weren’t loaded-down with fuel, they were lighter and more vulnerable to the release from the dam, which caused them to float toward the river. However no gasoline or diesel fuel was discharged from these trucks.” Spiegel said on Thursday morning that the company doesn’t know what actually caused the pipe to break and it may never be able to determine the cause. He added the leak was stopped by an employee who risked his life in the high flood waters to turn off the pipe’s flow with fire department oversight. In his statement, Spiegel said there is a significant difference between a crude oil spill and heating oil, both environmentally and in terms of health concerns. “People need to know that heating oil is non-carcinogenic and biodegradable,” said Spiegel, in the statement, citing the National Oilheat Research Alliance as his source. “The smell is noticeable and may cause some concern - but that quickly dissipates.” Monday’s strong odor of heating oil is now gone, Spiegel said, with Dolan confirming the same thing. Additionally, three or four empty oil tanks - ranging in size from 275 to 500 gallon tanks - were found floating down river but were recovered. There are still two empty tanks still left on the river’s bank. Spiegel said the New York State DEC is the lead agency overseeing cleanup efforts. New Jersey EPA officials continue to visit the site and have reported no incidents. Company pledge “The New Jersey EPA has applauded our efforts,” said Spiegel on Wednesday afternoon. “But that’s not to say we’re not concerned. Oil did go down the Ramapo River. The EPA is telling us that oil was among billions of gallons of water and almost all of it has dissipated … it’s non-existent. If anyone has an issue, give us a call. If there is an issue or an environmental problem, we want to take care of it.” Spiegel said additional work continues on site. “In addition to remediation, removing any products in our storage tanks is also being done because we don’t want to have future issues,” said Spiegel. “The smaller tanks, the DEC is not focusing on those tanks. They didn’t travel that far. They want us to continue with the clean up in the contained areas.” While Spiegel said he considers SOS Fuels to also be a storm victim, he knows it’s a bigger disaster for those who lost so many personal belongings. “This is a tragedy,” he said, adding the company has already put plans in place so fuel deliveries and service remains uninterrupted. “There’s a lot of devastation and we feel for everybody and we have deep concerns for everybody affected by this storm.”