'Thank God everyone is OK': Bellwood residents pick up the pieces after storm rips off roof of apartment building
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The extreme heat coming on the heels of last night's supercell storm.
Winds close to 90 miles per hour, tearing the roof off an apartment building in west suburban Bellwood. CBS 2's Asal Rezaei reports neighbors have been cleaning up the mess all day.
The storm's aftermath includes a demolished roof, forcing dozens of people to temporarily moveout. Anthony Smith is one of them, packing up to go stay with family for now because no one can stay in the building.
"No, it's not safe. There's no lights. There's nothing."
ComEd reports over 1,100 customers in Bellwood lost their power at some point during or after the storm. Pablo Acosta owns six of the18 units in the building and is on the condominium association's board.
"The first thing that we did this morning was we met with a city inspector, even the mayor came up here and they did an assessment of the building," Acosta said.
Half of the residents are able to grab what they could Tuesday, while the other half will be able to access their apartments Wednesday morning.
In a few weeks, people on the first and second floor can come back to live in their units once the roof is secure. But it'll be months before third floor residents can return.
"Thank God everyone is okay. The building can be replaced but someone's life, no. So thank God everyone came out alive."
A grateful feeling that's shared by homeowner Miguel Martinez just down the street. He said his family was inside when this massive tree came down on the front of their home.
No one was hurt and their power only went out for a few minutes.
"My family was in the living room, the couch sits right next to those windows, so could have just went through and hurt someone," Martinez said.
And its not just this block. As soon as you turn into Bellwood from I-290, you can see stop lights are out and more trees down. Lots of cleaning up left to do, not only for homeowners here, and at this apartment building, but the whole village will be recovering from the damage for at least a few more days.