Thousands of households in Greater Rochester area without power

Eversource officials say they are working as fast as possible to restore power. (Courtesy photo)

A severe ice storm that lingered overnight coated trees and powerlines with an inch of ice knocking out power to thousands of households in the Northern Seacoast.

The icestorm followed a heavy, wet snowfall that began Friday night and didn't let up till Saturday afternoon.

By today many of the conifers had at least an inch of ice on branches and needles causing them to droop heavily.

As of this morning Rochester is taking the brunt of the blackout, with 5,004 household still in the dark, followed by Barrington with 3,787, Dover with 2,355, Somersworth 899 and Milton with 606.

In Maine, Lebanon outages number 2,664 followed by Berwick with 2,014 and Acton with 218.

Both Eversource and CMP assured customers in emails sent out Friday that they are working as quickly as possible to restore power to those affected by the outages.