Emergency Services Tackled Range Of Problems In 2009

By Andrew Gorosko

Local emergency service personnel responded to a broad range of incidents during 2009, one of which symbolically drew much attention and posed travel delays in the town center due to the unusual nature of the problem.

The discovery of burning trash within a traveling garbage truck resulted in the shutdown of a 1,500-foot-long section of Main Street for almost three hours on the morning of October 20, causing traffic tie-ups in adjacent areas and travel delays in town.

Newtown Hook & Ladder and Hawleyville firefighters were dispatched to Main Street, at its intersection with Hanover Road, where trash was found burning inside a garbage truck operated by Associated Refuse Haulers of 352 South Main Street. There were no injuries in the incident.

Main Street was closed to through-traffic between its intersections with Schoolhouse Hill Road and with Church Hill Road. During that period, the fire was put out and a cleanup project took place. Police created detours to divert traffic from the area.

After arriving at the scene, firefighters emptied the garbage truck of its burning trash and then put out the smoldering garbage with a spray of water.

But the water that ran off the large load of garbage bore a dark pink color cast, prompting officials to call in a state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) inspector to investigate whether the trash contained any hazardous substances. Chemical testing at the scene showed that no hazardous materials were present.

Officials determined that the fire likely started within the garbage truck after the automated vehicle had picked up some trash that contained hot ashes.

In another emergency involving an industrial truck, on October 8, a tanker truck carrying a load of waste motor oil, while traveling on the Exit 11 off-ramp of Interstate 84, went off the ramp and rolled over several times, spilling about 2,300 gallons of the waste oil onto the turf of a median divider.

The incident resulted in a major environmental cleanup of contaminated soil.

State police said that trucker Noel T. Hann, 60, of New Rochelle, N.Y., was driving the 1991 Peterbilt tanker truck on the Exit 11 off-ramp, about 1,000 feet south of the ramp’s intersection with Wasserman Way, when Hann failed to negotiate a sharp curve on the ramp to the right and ran off the left shoulder of the ramp, entering the grassy median, resulting in the vehicle rolling over several times. Hann received hospital treatment for his injuries.

In another industrial waste emergency, on April 2, an intentional spillage of several thousand gallons of wastewater contaminated with industrial chemicals occurred at Newtown Car Wash on Simm Lane. The spillage resulted in a prompt cleanup at the site, and ensuing investigations by town and state officials.

On July 1, about 120 gallons of home heating fuel spilled from a basement in a house on Schoolhouse Hill Road in Sandy Hook, some of which found its way into a stream near Evergreen Road.

A DEP official credited Sandy Hook firefighters for prompt action in finding the source of the fuel spill, and then containing it, thus limiting the extent of environmental damage caused after the fuel entered a brook and floated downstream.

On a predawn July morning, a tandem tractor-trailer truck that was traveling on westbound Interstate 84’s Exit 10 off-ramp went out of control and traveled directly across Church Hill Road, damaging utility poles and lines, and destroying traffic signals, before careening down a steep embankment.

The accident caused the eight-hour closure of a heavily traveled section of Church Hill Road near I-84, as well as the westbound Exit 10 ramps of I-84, as utility work crews started repairing the extensive damage.

Police said that trucker Richard D. Coyle, 57, of Dunmore, Penn., was driving a 2007 Volvo tractor southward on the Exit 10 off-ramp which was hauling a tandem trailer at about 3 am just before the incident occurred. Coyle was injured in the crash.

Police said that Coyle told them that two deer had run out in front of the moving truck, so he swerved to avoid hitting them, but in doing so, he lost control of the vehicle on the wet pavement, resulting in the accident.

Chain Reaction Accident

Late on the morning of March 26, four people were injured and a dog was killed when a four-vehicle chain-reaction accident involving two tractor-trailer trucks occurred on westbound Interstate 84, near the Exit 11 off-ramp.

 Westbound traffic on the highway backed up into Middlebury as emergency service workers attended to the injured people, cleaned up the wreckage, and investigated the multiple-impact collision. The accident occurred on the section of westbound I-84 just east of the Philo Curtis Road overpass.

Firefighters extricated two people from a damaged van, which came to rest atop an embankment on the left side of the tri-lane highway. The rescuers removed the rear doors of the vehicle to extricate the injured pair from the vehicle, he said.

In February, town officials discussed with state Department of Transportation (DOT) officials how best to improve traffic safety along a hazardous section of Church Hill Road. Town officials have asked DOT engineers to pursue a project that would place a median divider along a widened section of Church Hill Road, just west of Interstate 84.

The variable-width median divider would be installed along the section of Church Hill Road extending from its intersection with the eastbound ramps of I-84 to its intersection with Commerce Road. The median would include a vehicle-turning gap located near Church Hill Road’s existing intersection with Edmond Road to facilitate traffic flow in the area.

As part of the road improvement project, the southern end of Edmond Road would be shifted to the west, creating a four-way intersection of Edmond Road, Church Hill Road, and Commerce Road. The existing approximately 650-foot-long southern end of Edmond Road thus would be removed. Also, improved traffic signals would be installed in the area. The project has been in the planning stages for several years.

During 2009, the town police department’s traffic enforcement unit stepped up efforts to gain motorists’ compliance with traffic laws. The unit’s members drive a specialized unmarked traffic enforcement car, as well as a motorcycle in enforcing traffic laws.

Crosswalks

In an experiment, the town installed temporary “raised crosswalks” on Queen Street and on Glover Avenue in seeking to gauge whether such hybrid devices would both provide a safe place for people to cross the street and also slow down motorists in the area.

In July, former Newtown resident Nicholas Clark, 33, was sentenced by a Waterbury Superior Court judge to spend 75 years in state prison for the brutal 2007 Waterbury bludgeoning murder of Erich Tabert, 26, a man who had become the new boyfriend of Clark’s estranged wife, Christa Clark. The sentence included prison time for related crimes.

In late August, it was learned that a man who died in Weston after the stolen vehicle that he was driving crashed into a utility pole during a police chase was the same man who had stolen a different vehicle from a resident of Oak Ridge Drive in Newtown on the previous day.

Samuel Marino, 26, stole a SUV from a woman at her home at Oak Ridge Drive on August 24. In a home invasion, Marino entered an Oak Ridge Drive house through an open garage door, confronted a woman resident inside and demanded the keys to a SUV, which he then stole and drove off on a crime spree.

Marino made no threat of violence, nor showed a weapon during the Oak Ridge Drive incident. The woman was not injured but was shaken up by the episode, according to police.

Old Investigation Reopened

In seeking new clues to answer longstanding questions over a local woman’s suspicious disappearance almost 23 years ago, town police in 2009 continued working on their reopened investigation into what happened to Regina Brown.

Ms Brown, an American Airlines flight attendant, was last seen on March 26, 1987, according to police. The mother of three young children, Ms Brown was 35 years old when she disappeared.

Police described her as an African American of Creole descent with very light skin, noting that many people thought she was Caucasian.

Also, police are continuing their investigation into extensive vandalism that occurred at St Rose Cemetery off Black Cherry Lane in Sandy Hook overnight on October 31/November 1.

Police estimate that vandals caused more than $15,000 worth of damage to the cemetery for St Rose of Lima Church, which lies about two miles away on Church Hill Road.

A reward is being offered for information that leads to the identification and arrest of the people responsible for the property damage.

In August, the Borough Zoning Board of Appeals unanimously rejected the Newtown Hook and Ladder Fire Company’s request for a zoning variance submitted in connection with the fire company’s proposal to build a new firehouse at 12 Sugar Street.

The action came amid stiff neighborhood opposition to granting a zoning variance to allow the fire company to build a firehouse closer to the street than the zoning regulations would normally allow.

The fire company is seeking a new firehouse to replace its existing deteriorated structure at 45 Main Street.

Garner Correctional Institution, the state’s high-security prison at 50 Nunnawauk Road, is under new leadership with the promotion of Scott Semple, a former deputy warden there, to the post of warden.

In July, Warden Semple replaced James Dzurenda as the top state Department of Correction (DOC) official at the 245,000-square-foot prison, which opened in November 1992. Mr Dzurenda was promoted within the DOC to supervise operations at multiple prisons.

Garner now is being managed by its fifth warden. From its opening until 1996, Frank Crose oversaw the prison. From 1996 to 1999, Remi Acosta was in charge. In 1999, Giovanny Gomez became warden, turning over the post to Mr Dzurenda in 2005.