Flooding Concerns Increase As Tropical Storm Irene Comes Through

Trees, branches and power lines are strewn across shoreline roads, making travel difficult all along the shore and impossible in many places.

As the worst of the storm was over as noon approached Sunday, state officials were looking toward electric power restoration and the next steps as crews headed into the hardest hit neighborhoods.

Connecticut led tube & Power Company announced 537,000 power outages by 11:30 a.m. in a total that continued climbing throughout the morning and will likely climb further.

The number of outages is the highest in recent memory, and crews will likely take days to restore all power. With large numbers of downed trees from Greenwich to Old Saybrook, state and local officials will be working overtime in the coming days to restore the state to normalcy.

Federal officials issued another warning late Sunday morning that motorists should still stay off the roads -- from North Carolina to Maine. On the federal level, homeland security chief Janet Napolitano says it is a three-step process: "preparation, response and recovery." That is the same situation in Connecticut.

As high tide arrived along the shoreline, flooding concerns from Fairfield to New London increased.

Interstate 95 in Waterford is littered with debris. Route 1 is closed in places, and crews are using plows to clear the roads.

At the Lisman Landing Marina at the Milford harbor, John Natale was riding his bike down an access road to check on his boat.

The water was about a foot and a half deep on the road, Natale said, and while the road is normally three to four feet above the water, boats were floating above road level Sunday morning.

The water appeared to be about four feet above its normal level, Natale said.

The tide continues to rise, with waters swelling about eight inches in 30 minutes.