Cleanup Continues After Strong Storms Hit Region, Thousands Still Without Power
By Jan Carabeo
WAYNE, Pa., (CBS) -- As tens of thousands of people remained in the dark Wednesday after strong storms uprooted trees and took down power lines, hard-hit Delaware County started cleaning up.
A number of large trees came crashing down along Fariston Road in Wayne on Tuesday night, some falling on several homes and causing extensive damage (see previous story).
"It was literally raining bricks," Bill Conway said, describing how a tree took out his chimney. "The tree landed on the roof and slid back, and the root ball became a bulldozer."
Neighbors say the strong winds came and went in what seemed like an instant, toppling 150-foot trees.
"The first tree guy that came this morning told me they have to find the largest crane they can in the tri-state area," Conway said.
Bill Conway and his family had just gotten out of the pool for the night. The tree that's been nearby for at least a 100 years took out everything in its path. Some of the branches just missed his neighbor's home. And one more house down, another decades-old tree was uprooted and took down wires as it fell.
"I'm devastated for some of my neighbors," Lori Geiling said.
Meanwhile, PECO power crews were busy throughout the day fixing poles and lines.
At the peak, more than a quarter of a million people were left in the dark. PECO say this storm's strong winds were especially troublesome.
"They're not only breaking a tree branch, but their carrying it, so it can blown in the wind into our equipment," PECO spokesperson Cathy Engel Menendez said.
PECO has more than 1,000 employees and contractors working around the clock throughout the Philadelphia region.
Even so, because there were so many outages, PECO says some customers could remain without power until Friday. However, the utility hopes to have the majority of people back on line Wednesday night or Thursday.
In Bucks County, the American Red Cross staffed a shelter at Tulleytown Municipal Center at 500 Main Street in Tulleytown for residents without power. The shelter was closed late Wednesday night as power was restored to the area.
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