Brookhaven Battling Damage, Saturation From Rain

Town of Brookhaven highway crews worked through Monday night and deep into Tuesday trying to clean out catch basins and keep drainage pipes unclogged during this recent rainfall, according to Highway Superintendent Dan Losquadro.

Losquadro said about 10 crews of four men worked around the clock during the storm and was resuming its cleanup duties to some of the most impacted areas of Brookhaven, such as Patchogue and Blue-Point on the south shore; Miller Place, Rocky Point and Sound Beach to the north. 

The superintendent said a number of the storm drains in Brookhaven are merely holes in the ground with a "leeching field," whereby the water gets absorbed into the ground. But in light of the recent heavy rains, much of the ground has already had its fill.

"These catch basins haven't had a chance to absorb the water," Losquadro said. "It’s a constant process. Unfortunately with these heavy rains back to back the ground is so saturated it just can’t absorb any more water."

Losquadro said Monday's rains also undermined some of the repair work done on the north shore of the township in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy. He said the speed and velocity of the runoff in the hillier regions of Rocky Point, Miller Place, Shoreham and Sound Beach have caused some erosion to those repair projects. In addition, the storm drains in those hamlets were not proving as effective because the water was moving so quickly it passed right over the grates. 

The superintendent said he was out with a crew on Holbrook Road in Coram where the team was able to pump water from a single-standing catch basin and run the water through a hose into a connected drainage system, which helped alleviate some of the heavier flooding on the road.

"We’re responding to hot spots," he said. "We’re trying to make the roads safe and passable."

Now the crews are concentrating on getting the drainage systems to operate without obstruction, especially in light of recent news that more rainfall is on the way. Teams are clearing debris away from storm grates and running a high pressured water hose through the underground drain pipes to make sure there are no clogs, according to Losquadro.

"Today it’s making sure we are checking all the drainage systems we have so they’re completely operational," he said. 

Patch has calls in to the town about the cost of these storms. We'll report on those figures when they are presented.