Utility Repairs Last Well Into Night on Route 114

It was more than 12 hours since brutal winds whipped through Route 114, knocking three utility poles to the ground and snapping or bending about five others, and still the road wasn't back open Thursday night.

Danvers police said around 10:30 p.m. that the one-third of a mile stretch of road at the Peabody-Danvers line would remain closed until at least 2 a.m. while crews finished making repairs. The road was expected to re-open in time for the morning rush hour.

Peabody police said Thursday night that a pole was still being replaced at the end of Mt. Pleasant Drive near the Outback Steakhouse.

With Route 114 closed to traffic, motorists were detoured onto MacArthur Boulevard via Walter Road (for westbound traffic) and Palmer Avenue (for eastbound traffic).

At one point, when the poles first snapped shortly before 10 a.m., about 900 customers in Peabody and Danvers lost power. That number was down to 300 two hours later.

By mid to late afternoon, businesses on Route 114 were reporting power had been restored. Peabody Municipal Light Plant confirmed that and said only a small amount of customers were still without electricity.

While residents and businesses in both communities were affected by the outages and detour, the damaged poles were all on the Peabody side of the line.