The National Weather Service issued a special weather statement around 8:59 p.m. Thursday, declaring an end to the possibility of a "severe weather event" that some forecasters feared would be much worse. Rain, with thunderstorms, was expected continue through the evening, the NWS said.
The storm itself was deemed a "dud" by some Patch readers in North Madison. The south end of town experienced heavy rain, lightning, and thunder, but the storm itself passed through quickly.
Some areas of the state were not so lucky. As of 11 p.m., there were almost 11,000 CL&P customers without power, most of them south of Hartford and West of New Haven. There were about 130 without power in Westbrook, and about a dozen in Branford, but other areas towns appeared to be largely unaffected by outages.
Lightning strikes and downed trees were reported in some parts of the state. WXedge, part of the WTNH.com website, said the storm "raced through" the state at about 45 to 50 mph:
We will learn more about the damage from this line of thunderstorms as the storm reports start filtering into the National Weather Service tonight and tomorrow. One thing we know for sure is that there weren't any Tornado Warnings issued for Connecticut, and the members of Storm Team 8 didn't spot any tornado signatures on radar. But there were many reports of trees down, and fires that were presumably sparked by lightning strikes.
Madison Hose Co. No. 1, Madison Ambulance Association, and Madison police responded to multiple calls Thursday, including several unrelated to the storm.
There was a report of a motor vehicle accident near the intersection of Durham Road and Wellsweep Drive Thursday morning. Thursday evening around 7:45 p.m., as a storm rolled into the area, emergency responders were called to Madison Beach Hotel to deal with a stuck elevator. It was not immediately clear whether there was anyone in the elevator.
An initial report came in later about a possible water rescue of multiple people in a dinghy off of Webster Point, but that report appears to have been unfounded.
The extended forecast from the National Weather Service for Madison is as follows:
- Friday: A chance of showers and thunderstorms. Some of the storms could produce gusty winds and heavy rain. Patchy fog before 9am. Otherwise, mostly cloudy, with a high near 85. West wind 6 to 8 mph. Chance of precipitation is 50%. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms.
- Friday Night: A chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly before midnight. Some of the storms could produce heavy rain. Patchy fog after midnight. Otherwise, mostly cloudy, with a low around 71. Light northwest wind. Chance of precipitation is 40%.
- Saturday: A chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly after noon. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 81. Northeast wind 5 to 7 mph becoming south in the afternoon. Chance of precipitation is 50%. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms.
- Saturday Night: A chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly before midnight. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 67. North wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening. Chance of precipitation is 40%.
- Sunday: A slight chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 82. Chance of precipitation is 20%.
- Sunday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 66.
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