Middleburgh mayor Matthew Avitabile posted about the village's storm preparations on the village's news blog on Friday:
The Village is preparing vital information to be released door to door. This will include where to go, evac urgency, routes, safety precautions, emergency contact, and others based on what we learned from running the response last time. If you would like to help distribute, let me know.
As for some good news:
Through Assemblyman Lopez's office, we have made progress. NYC has agreed to release 600 million gallons of water daily from the Gilboa Reservoir to the Ashokan Reservoir to the south. This will not solve all of our issues, but it will reduce the pressure on the Gilboa and the Power Authority dams. There is excess capacity in the other dams that can reduce our load further should we be inundated.
We are preparing for the worst, even if the storm moves out of our immediate pathway.
We will keep the Village Office open on Tuesday after normal hours, possibly 24 hours as the municipal response center. We will have volunteers, food, and information ready for anyone that needs it. The Elementary School will be open as a shelter. We will monitor and try to open others as we get closer.
For quick updates, you may call or text (prefer text in case I'm in a meeting) me at 518-763-6854. I will try to keep this page updated as much as possible.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo also mentioned New York City's emergency water releases in a statement earlier today, in which he declared all 62 New York State counties under a state of emergency:
- New York Power Authority (NYPA): The water level of the Blenheim-Gilboa Pumped Storage Power Project's lower reservoir on the Schoharie Creek has been lowered to the minimum depth as a precaution against flood conditions. NYPA has also released water to lower the level of the Hinckley Reservoir where it operates a small-hydro facility to create additional storage capacity.
- The Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is working closely with the New York City Department of Environmental Protection to lower the water level in the Schoharie and Ashokan reservoirs to prevent flooding in Schoharie and the Catskills. DEC has authorized an emergency drawdown of the Schoharie Reservoir at a rate of approximately 600 million gallons per day. Lowering the water level can reduce the amount of water that may spill over the top of the Gilboa dam and flow downstream into the Schoharie Creek. This release will assist in creating a void space in the Schoharie Reservoir. Waters drained from the Schoharie is diverted to flow through the Shandaken Tunnel to the Esopus Creek then into the Ashokan Reservoir. DEC has authorized releases from the Ashokan Reservoir at a rate of 600 million gallons per day to facilitate a reduction in peak storm flows through maximization of reservoir storage capacity. These releases will be terminated at the onset of storm precipitation or if any flood risk arises based on monitored stream gauges.
