'Mangled Mess': Cleanup Ongoing After Tornado Hits Slidell

Cleanup and recovery efforts continued in Slidell, southeast Louisiana, on Thursday, April 11, after an EF-1 tornado struck the area the previous day.

Footage posted by Slidell Police shows extensive damage and crews working to restore power lines in the south side of the city on Thursday.

“As you can see, utility services have shown up in numbers in this specific area, trying to begin managing the mangled mess of downed trees and power lines,” an officer says in the video.

“The storm packed a punch, it came in quick, made a statement and got out,” they added. Credit: Slidell Police Department via Storyful

Video Transcript

- All right, guys. Sergeant Morris coming to you from the area of Old Spanish Trail and Pine Tree Street, City Drive-- part of the path of destruction from yesterday's tornado. As you can see, utility services have shown up in numbers in this specific area, trying to begin managing the mangled mess of downed trees, power lines, and hopefully on the track to restoring power to those affected in this area shortly. This storm packed a punch, and it came in quick, made a statement, and got out.

This is the property of ECO Builders. As you can see, they have some of their employees and crew on scene beginning the process of clearing it out and rebuilding. There's a lot of work to be done here.

You got the power services actively working to restore the power. So hopefully we'll have an update from them later on this evening. Here's the Courtney Heights Apartments. Again, they sustained severe damage. There's crews working over there as well to begin the cleanup process. We just wanted to touch base with the followers, show the progress that's being done. I know y'all can't get out here safely to see it for yourself, so we wanted to bring it to you. We'll have more updates along the way. Y'all stay tuned.

Hey, y'all. We're back again. This time, we're at the location of Pontchartrain and Kostmayer. What you're looking at is Kostmayer facing towards Abney Elementary. And as you can see, they have several different power poles snapped in half, line across the roadway. They got debris everywhere. They have power lines hanging low. It's a real hazard for the community and motorists to be around. So this section of the roadway is going to be blocked off until we can safely clear the road of the debris and the power lines. But we wanted to bring you an update of this location specifically.

This was one of the more direct hits that the city took. This property, at the corner of Pontchartrain and Kazmaier, is at a complete loss. They have virtually nothing left on the inside. They had several customers that had damaged boats and 18-wheelers as a result. We'll go walk and show you a little bit more.

I apologize if it's hard to hear me. There's a lot of traffic on the roadway currently, and it's very windy outside.

This vehicle was left in the parking lot during the storm, just preparing for it to be any ordinary storm. We didn't think there was actually going to be a tornado that touched down. But as you can see, the windows were shattered out from the force of the winds. The vehicle sustained damage.

Again, this is the area of Pontchartrain and Kostmayer.

And if you look down across the way at McDonald's-- let's see if I can zoom in for you-- you can see a vehicle laying on its side. That vehicle was occupied by a McDonald's employee at the time that the tornado was wreaking havoc. The vehicle flipped over on its side. The employee was trapped. One of our officers was quickly on scene and helped that employee out of the vehicle. You might not be able to see it, but looking down Pontchartrain towards Oak Harbor, there's just a debris field, and there's power poles hanging everywhere.

Again, this storm came in and hit hard and left quick, but its destruction is long-lasting, but it's nothing that we can't work through and rebuild and move forward from. But it is a reminder that Mother Nature is capable of the unimaginable.

Again, it's a hazard for motorists and pedestrians to be walking in this area. Parts of the roadway are blocked off for those purposes. We'll update as it gets cleared out and reopens. We wanted to bring you video so that you can see what we're looking at and not have to risk your safety coming to see it for yourself. So we're going to try to venture into a couple of neighborhoods so you can get an idea of what our residential sections experienced and the types of damage that occurred with them. And we'll post a video on that a little later on guys.

All righty. Y'all stay tuned.