Storms rip through the area Monday night

Joe Centers, Norwalk Reflector, Ohio
·2 min read

Jun. 14—NORWALK — Chris Kluding was sound asleep when he heard a loud boom.

"It scared the ---- out of me," Kluding said. "It woke me right up, I didn't hear a thing until it happened. It was about 11, 11:30. I heard a crack."

Kluding's house at 84 Norwood Avenue in Norwalk received serious damage during Monday night's storm that rocked the area.

A tree next door fell on Kluding's house and busted through his roof. He had a renter on the second floor but his bedroom was on the other side of the house, Kluding said.

Kluding said he called his insurance man once it happened and left a message. He got a return call at 6:30 a.m. Tuesday.

"They got on it right away," he said.

There were trees and limbs galore down around the area, which caused plenty of power and cable outages.

Firelands Electric reported powerful winds and thunderstorms swept through the cooperative's service territory beginning late Monday and extending into the early morning hours Tuesday, causing widespread damage to trees and power lines.

The second round of strong storms early Tuesday morning resulted in additional damage in areas that had previously been spared, resulting in more than 4,000 member-consumers of Firelands Electric Cooperative to be without power in portions of Ashland, Huron and Richland counties. Nearly all of the outages involve tree damage.

Firelands' line crews worked throughout the night and into the morning removing tree debris, clearing roads and repairing lines to safeguard first responders. Crews will continue working to assess tree damage and restore power throughout the day, especially the hardest hit areas, located across southern Ashland and Richland counties.

"Once damaging winds and lightning began causing outages, our linemen were ready for the call, working quickly to begin the process of assessing damage and restoring power as safely as possible," General Manager Dan McNaull said. "Safety is always our first priority."

Ohio Edison had a number of outages, many of them around the Norwalk/Milan area.

The city of Norwalk compost facility will open until 3 p.m. Tuesday for residents to dispose of storm damage. Proper ID is required. The facility also will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday.