To the Editor:

At about 1 am on the night of May 16, my wife suffered a medical emergency. The doctor said she should get to a hospital as soon as possible.

The timing could not have been worse. This was only hours after the storm and violent macroburst had made many Newtown roads impassable with fallen trees and wires, including ours, Tamarack Road.

We were blocked in. Tamarack is a connector road between Echo Valley and Hanover roads. An exit toward Echo Valley was totally impossible, with numerous downed trees and wires on both Tamarack and Echo Valley. The Hanover direction was blocked beyond our house by a large tree down lengthwise on Tamarack and another one fallen across that tree but suspended by wires just above it.

The ambulance could not get beyond the Hanover Road railroad bridge, which is over a mile from our house. Hanover Road from the railroad bridge to the Echo Valley intersection and beyond sustained numerous fallen trees, downed wires, and some utility poles. It was passable with difficulty only to a smaller vehicle, such as a car, and then only because the previous evening, crews had opened what amounted to a series of small tunnels under, through, and around fallen trees and wires. It was a hazardous route not passable to a vehicle larger than a car, certainly not an ambulance.

My wife's situation was becoming desperate. At about 3 am, three EMTs showed up. They had made it by pickup truck to the far side of the trees blocking the Tamarack Road-Hanover exit and walked the rest of the way. My wife was now very weak. There was no way we could get her out, but the EMT crew notified authorities of a medical priority. Leaving at dawn, they encountered our neighbor Lou Reda. The two downed trees had fallen on the road in front of his house. They told him of our situation.

About 9 am, we learned an early morning team of Lou, other neighbors, and a town crew had cut up and removed the tree that was down lengthwise in the road and cut a tunnel under the tree suspended by wires above the road. We could now could get out in the car to Hanover Road and to Yale Hospital, where she spent the next 16 days.

We wish to express deep appreciation to Lou Reda, Jeremy and Krista Benson, and the other Tamarack Road neighbors, and anyone else who pitched in that early morning to open a car path through the downed trees and wires, allowing us to get out and get my wife to the hospital.

Jim Wright

Tamarack Road, Newtown June 18, 2018