Patti VanKesteren, of Miller Place, stood at a wooden beach fence in T. Bayles Minuse Mill Pond Park in Stony Brook one morning earlier this month, stunned by the scene in front of her.

She remembered visiting the mill pond, also known as Duck Pond, more than a year ago to stroll the grounds with her grandson Bennett.

Ducks and geese had paddled in the placid pond under brilliant skies. The occasional car had traversed Harbor Road on a bridge spanning a dam.

But now the pond and the bridge were gone. VanKesteren stared at what remained of the overpass after a 100- to 200-foot section was washed away last Aug. 18-19 when the dam broke during a torrential rainstorm.

WHAT NEWSDAY FOUND

A year after a torrential, destructive rainstorm swept across the North Shore, repairs to a bridge a

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