Severe Spring Storms Topple Trees, Cause Power Outages
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – Severe storms moved through Western Pennsylvania Friday toppling trees, and causing some power outages.
Heavy rain, wind, and hail started falling Friday afternoon, turning some streets white.
Some of the hail was nearly the size of golf balls.
Falling trees were the problem on the north side of Pittsburgh. A big tree fell in Bellevue about 4 p.m. this afternoon.
The tree fell on top of at least one car, and it pulled down the power lines as well.
In Butler, it wasn't power lines but homes and cars that got the brunt of the storm.
Fran Strobel of Butler witnessed the damage first hand after her pizza delivery driver had a giant tree swept up by the winds collapse onto her windshield.
"I just signed for the pizza, she got in her car I got in the house and I heard the crack and the tree was on her car," Strobel says.
The pizza delivery driver walked away unscathed.
Tom Fix and his family weren't hurt when a tree clipped the side of their home but his chimney is now in the driveway with limbs and leaves.
"It shook the house a bit. I was sitting on the couch and you could see it rolling past the windows it was almost like it was in slow motion coming down," Fix says.
Fix says although his insurance company may not be happy with the damage, he's just glad no one was hurt.
"Oh my God! It was just like unbelievable. It just hit so quickly!" said Bonita Farinelli.
A tent set up for a special event at her home decor business in Carnegie came crashing down Friday afternoon with three musicians inside.
"The wind came through so quickly, the tent came down and the musicians just did whatever they could to get out," said Farinelli. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
The crawl between art-oriented businesses in Carnegie continued as crews outside took away the mangled tent.
A section of Noblestown Road in Green Tree was shut down after a 75 year-old tree fell over onto power lines.
Dan Black says the wind was fierce and all of sudden got super-strong.
"It got like four times stronger for like thirty seconds. The tree went flying down," said Black.
Over in Crafton, Jeannie Shumovich stood staring at the huge section of tree that landed in her backyard.
It bent up a metal table, landed on her car and smashed apart a section of her backyard fence.
Fire fighters blocked off the area because they feared the tree would bring down live power lines.
"It was just wind. Almost horizontal rain," said Shumovich, in describing the storm. "Just voooom! In duration, ten minutes but very, very violent!"
Severe storms will diminish into Friday evening with just showers overnight into Saturday.
RELATED LINKS:
Latest Conditions
Weather Map
Radar
Traffic Alerts
Traffic Cams
Send Us Your Weather Photos
