Griffith Police Chief Al Tharp said firefighters had six crews out Tuesday and checked on over 60 homes.
They were looking for any “threats to safety” or people, for example, with medical issues who needed oxygen. Some locations they took from 211 calls, he said.
As of Wednesday, NIPSCO’s online outage map showed nearly 4,600 Griffith residents were still without power.
The biggest issue was still “foliage wrapped up in lines,” he said. Public Works “can’t do anything until NIPSCO confirms (the power lines) are dead.”
He said anyone with immediate safety or health problems should call 911. Those with issues that can wait can contact their police social worker Erica Rios.
Rios can be reached at 219-924-7503 ex. 300, or [email protected].
The Town of Munster has taken a more organic approach to welfare checks, Police Chief Steve Scheckel said. The town’s Volunteers in Police Service have posted up at the Lions Club Social Center on Calumet Avenue, and residents coming in for food, cooling and charging are leading the charge.
“A lot are actually neighbors who’re coming to the social center and letting us know,” Scheckel said Wednesday. “It’s usually, ‘Hey, can you go check on so-and-so at this address? They’re older and we haven’t seen them in a day or two. We’ve had several dozen checks like that, way more than we typically have.”
For Scheckel, it’s the only good thing that’s come out of this disaster, he said.
“We were showing NIPSCO contractors around the northeast side of town the other day, and one of them who’d been in the Carolinas after Hurricane Helene looked at it and said, “I’ve never seen anything like this,’ so it warms this old cop’s heart to see so many volunteers who’ve rolled up their sleeves and helped each other,” he said. “It’s truly amazing.”
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The town has 3,162 outages remaining, according to NIPSCO’s outage website.
The What’s Up Munster Facebook page was also helpful for linking one neighbor who need some assistance in clearing some fallen trees in his yard on Kraay Avenue. Munster residents in the comments saw the call for help and mobilized to send someone with a chainsaw and scheduled the Munster High School football team to pick up the debris in the afternoon.
The man with the chainsaw, who only wanted to give his first name of Mike, said he’s noticed that sometimes people aren’t always able to verbalize exactly what they need done, so he was happy to load up his truck and provide a service.
“I was on Schreiber the other day and we got a good chunk of work done,” he said. “I’m just doing it for free. I don’t want to see people get goaded into (debris removal) contracts.”
Freelance reporter Michelle L. Quinn contributed