YARMOUTH, Maine — As of Monday afternoon, Cumberland County is grappling with significant power outages following a major ice storm, affecting more than 40,000 residents.
One of the areas hit hardest by the outage is Yarmouth, extending into Cousins Island. Residents face challenges accessing essential services and dealing with the aftermath of the storm.
"We lost [power at] about 9 p.m. on Saturday night and it's been out, and it will be out for a long while because of the telephone pole down and all the trees down, we were not prepared as well as we could have been," Roy Prussner, a resident of Cousins Island, said.
The situation on Cousins Island worsened when a telephone pole fell, blocking access for residents on Sandy Point Road.
The town of Yarmouth was able to come out and clear the road on Sunday night, allowing residents to come and go to get gas and food, but the power restoration process is expected to be lengthy.
With no immediate relief in sight, residents are forced to rely on portable generators to maintain essential services.
Donald Zimmer, a Yarmouth resident, expressed his concerns.
"If we get three days out of this, we're going to be very lucky," Zimmer said.
However, the cost of running generators adds up.
"So far, it's [cost] $78.36, but I'm not done," Zimmer added.
"I think it's a little harder here, we aren't as populated as Portland, so I would think they get back power to shopping centers where the population is," Jim Kern, another Cousins Island resident, said.
Prussner echoed this sentiment.
"It's going to be a week or so before we get power here because of the pole they have to replace," Prussner said.
The outage situation extends beyond Cumberland County, with more than 73,000 Mainers still without power, according to the Central Maine Power outages map.