When a storm nailed the Wright County area on Monday, May 4 with reports of winds reaching between 70-90 m.p.h., the situation quickly grew dangerous for residents throughout our area.
Some houses in its path were either completely destroyed or had big portions of them missing due to the wind’s destruction.
Large trees everywhere were completely uprooted. Intercounty Electric Cooperative reported 31 broken utility poles mostly in the Mountain Grove area alone. Se-Ma-No Electric Cooperative reportedly had 35 broken utility poles in their coverage area.
Throw in having metal roofs lifted off both the Mansfield High School and Norwood Post Office, and the storm surely left its mark.
One week later, evidence from the storm is still very visible in the area of Morris Rd., Gumbo Rd. and other roads in the vicinity.
I worked all week long trying to get an official photo from U.S. Cellular to show their damaged tower as they quickly tore it down due to safety concerns after the storm destroyed it. It was near the top of the hill on Morris Rd. Suffice to say, our photo on page one is worth a thousand words.
In spite of all the destruction left behind by the storm, amazingly there were no reports of injuries that I’m aware of and no one was killed during the storm.
When driving in the area of Morris Rd. for a second time at the end of last week, the impact left me a little emotional. I started thinking about how scary it must have been to ride that storm out. I just took some time thanking God that no one was killed. I also prayed for those affected by this storm and for their clean up efforts.
Again, just thankful that everyone survived.
