As Massachusetts residents stock up on groceries, bring in their lawn chairs and find their flashlights in advance of Hurricane Henri’s arrival Sunday, communities are getting prepared.
As Massachusetts residents stock up on groceries, bring in their lawn chairs and find their flashlights in advance of Hurricane Henri’s arrival Sunday, communities are getting prepared. “We’re preparing for the worst, hoping for the best,” said Quincy Police Lt. Robert Gillan, who said the storm’s weekend turn west may help mitigate the worst impacts of the storm there. While the unusual Category 1 hurricane is now expected to track far enough west to avoid a direct hit on eastern Massachusetts, there’s still the fear that the high tides during the hurricane — which are particularly high this weekend because of the phase of the moon — could lead to coastal flooding when mixed with the storm surge, rain and winds. Quincy, where Gillan is the harbormaster, is no stranger to storm flooding. After one 2018 winter storm, residents in peninsula areas were badly flooded, cutting residents off from the mainland. “We haven’t seen any panic. We have been pushing out on social media advisories, and we have been working with our emergency management, all the department heads to collectively respond so we don’t get caught off guard like we did in 2018,” Gillan said.
