LEWISTON — Wednesday’s weather was not fit for man nor beast. And at
least one beast can attest to the fact: A cat spent more than a full
day crouched near power lines high above Nomar Court.

“I kept watching him and watching him,” said Janet Fontaine,
who could see the shivering cat from her window. “They said he’d come
down by himself. I put food out for him but he didn’t come down. I was
scared he was going to die out there.”

Fontaine first noticed the long-haired cat balanced on an Oxford
Networks electrical box Tuesday morning. More than 24 hours
later, the animal was still up there and the weather was colder and it
snowing heavily.

Enter Animal Control Officer Wendell Strout. He’s rescued cats from trees and rooftops, but this was a first.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen one on the wires before,” he said.

By noon, the dark-colored cat was covered in snow. A Central Maine
Power Co. worker was sent to the scene with a cherry picker to attempt the rescue. He rose high in the bucket and got within arm’s reach of the animal. He petted the cat and gently tried to get his hands around it.

At that point, the cat decided to rescue itself. It leaped from the
lines, dropped roughly 30 feet, landed in soft snow and ran off.

“Nine times out of ten,” said Strout, “that’s what they do.”

All was well with the pole-climbing cat, though he remained enigmatic.

“I don’t know who he belongs to,” Fontaine said. “It’s been in the neighborhood for years.”

Meanwhile, downtown, Deputy Police Chief James Minkowsky knew that
locals were prepared for the storm based on what he didn’t see, more
than on what he did see.

“I’m looking out my window right now,” Minkowsky said just before the afternoon commute. “There’s hardly any traffic at all.”

By that time, there had been only three car crashes, each of them
minor. The bigger problem was on Sabattus Street, near Chadbourne Road, where a water main had burst beneath the street.

Crews dug up the road and police diverted traffic around the area,
causing snarls on the heavily traveled road. Work beneath the street
was expected to continue into Wednesday night.

Around 6 p.m., a tractor-trailer jackknifed and slid off Ferry
Road.  Nobody was hurt but police and Public Works shut down the
roadway while towing crews pulled the truck back onto the roadway.

By nightfall, 9 inches of snow had fallen on Lewiston and surrounding towns. Police did not wait that long to trade cruisers for better forms of mobility on slick roads.

“We’ve partially grounded the fleet,” Minkowsky said. “Public Works provided us some of their Blazers so we can get around a little better.”

As expected, snow turned to rain at about 6 p.m. But problems did
not end with the last flakes. Heavy winds and wet, heavy snow was
bringing down power lines, causing power outages in some areas. Those CMP crews not involved in cat rescues were out making repairs to damaged lines.

“So far, our crews have been able to keep up with the scattered
outages reported this afternoon and early evening,” said CMP spokesman John Carroll. “But heavy snow loading up tree limbs and branches, combined with strong, gusty winds, could cause new outages as this storm continues to move through the area this evening and overnight.”

The numbers were not overwhelming. By dinnertime, no outages were
reported in Androscoggin County. There were 460 in Oxford County and
nearly 2,000 in Cumberland County.

In Auburn, like most other cities and towns, a parking ban was in
effect overnight and into Thursday morning as crews prepared to clean the streets.

This unidentified cat sits on an Oxford Networks box on a utility pole. After a day and a half, he was coaxed down by a lineman from Central Maine Power Co. Visit www.sunjournal.com for a video of the rescue.

A crew from the Lewiston Public Works Department Water and Sewer Division excavated a section of road on outer Sabattus Street to repair a water main break on Wednesday.

Heather Hartley struggles to push her stroller on the Hammond Street sidewalk in Lewiston Wednesday morning while her daughter Chantae, 2, weathers the storm. She didn’t want to miss a doctor’s appointment.

Brittany Byer, 10, helps keep the sidewalk clear of snow in front of her fathers store, Corner Variety at the corner of Cedar and Lincoln streets in Lewiston Wednesday morning. “It gives her something to do and helps me out since she isn’t in school today,” said her father, Larry, working at the cash register.