Frontier eyes cracked Naugatuck utility poll

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A cracked utility pole on Scott Street in Naugatuck near the intersection of Gorman and Lewis streets can be seen last Monday. Andreas Yilma Republican-American

By Andreas Yilma Citizen’s News

NAUGATUCK — A severely cracked utility pole was scheduled to be replaced by Frontier Communications.

There is a small streak of broken glass and wood chips around the cracked wooden pole near 79 Scott St. and the intersection of Gorman and Lewis streets. The pole has identification number 1310 written on it and replaced a previous pole there in 2019, according to the system Frontier shares with Eversource Energy, Frontier spokeswoman Brigid M. Smith said.

“We are verifying the new pole was hit again and we were not notified, so our engineers are looking at the pole (Wednesday, December 29),” Smith said Tuesday, December 28. “Pole removals require special caution.”

Frontier maintains the pole because the company is the custodian of it. Eversource is the joint owner. There are some cases where Eversource is the custodian and Frontier the joint owner of a utility pole. In that case, Eversource would be responsible for the maintenance of the pole, Smith said.

The local police and fire departments don’t have any records of an incident with a vehicle striking the pole. The departments presume the cracked pole is from a hit-and-run.