High winds wreak havoc in 3-county area
Emergency personnel in the three-county area were quite busy Friday and into Saturday as heavy gusts of wind wreaked havoc throughout all of Southwestern Pennsylvania.
The National Weather Service in Pittsburgh said wind gusts reached up to 60 miles per hour, leading to widespread power outages and damage to trees and structures.
A wind gust of 66 mph at the Pittsburgh International Airport was one of the highest over recorded.
As of 1:30 p.m. Saturday, West Penn Power reported 72,789 customers without power, which was almost 10,000 customers less than about 90 minutes earlier. Washington County had 12,663 customers without service at that time, Fayette County 940 and Greene County 546.
Chris Richer, Washington fire chief, said his crews were extremely busy during the 24-hour stretch, answering 43 calls of service.
“It was a very damaging windstorm,” Richer said Saturday. “I’m very thankful that we didn’t have rain or snow with it. Most of the calls ranged from downed power lines to transformers on fire. There also were some downed trees and some minor electrical fires in homes caused by the wind and the power lines coming down. It was a busy night. We called in extra personnel and ran every apparatus we had out of the fire department. Between the police, public works and fire, it was a great team effort. No injuries were reported.”
Richer expected the majority of the cleanup efforts in the city to be completed by early Saturday evening.
A Fayette County 911 dispatcher described the 24-hour period quite succinctly.
“It was a total mess,” she said. “There were trees down all over the place.”
The dispatcher said Saturday was a day of cleaning up county back roads.
Canonsburg Mayor Dave Rhome said quite a few lines were down in the borough but there was one treacherous matter on North Central Avenue that needed attention.
“We had a pole that walked away from its base that has high tension lines at the top and a whole lot of data cables on it,” Rhome explained. “We called that in at about 9 p.m. (Friday). The winds were so bad that it would make the pole rock all the way to the left into the roadway area. When the winds would change, it would rock all the way to the gymnasium at the middle school. We ended up closing the roadway down.”
As of 1 p.m. Saturday, the road remained closed. Rhome figured it would take about 6-8 hours to rectify the matter once West Penn Power crews were available on what has been a busy Saturday for them.
Rhode said he was told West Penn Power had received more than 400 emergency calls as of 11 p.m. Friday.
Charleroi Fire Chief Robert Whiten Jr. said the time period wasn’t too bad for his crews, but they were on a few calls as well.
“We had one in Speers, one in Twilight and assisted on one in Carroll Township and there was a brush fire,” he said. “There were a few trees down in town. In Twilight, a tree blew a transformer down.”
Charleroi was an area that did have some major power outages during the storm.
That resulted in the cancellation of the Harvest Bounty Craft and Vendor Show scheduled Saturday at Charleroi Elementary School. A new date for the show has not been announced.
The craft and vendor show is the largest annual fundraiser for Harvest Bounty, a program which makes sure Charleroi students have food for the weekend. Currently, about 320 students across the district receive food bags each week to take home for the weekend.
Downed trees in wires forced the closure of portions of several roadways.
Those roads in Washington County are:
Route 231 in Blaine and Donegal townships between Route 221 (Buffalo Creek Road) and Buck Run Road/Camp Buffalo Road
Route 1006 (Rankintown Road/Washington Avenue/Venetia Road/Linden Road/Finleyville Road/Elmara Road) in North Strabane/Nottingham/Union townships between Thomas Eighty Four Road and Munntown Road and between Elmara Road and Sawmill Road
Route 2007 (Banetown Road/Scenic Drive/Hackney Station Road) in Amwell Township between Hinerman Road and Vankirk Ridge Road
Route 2027 (Twilight Hollow Road/State Street/Daily Road/Maple Drive) in Twilight between Spruce Lane and North Avenue
Route 2032 (Deer Run Lane) in West Pike Run Township between Route 481 and South Ridge Road
Route 2073 (Malden Road) in Centerville and California boroughs between Route 40 and Malden Drive
Route 3008 (Jolly School Road/Lagonda Road) in South Franklin Township between Mounts Road and Route 18
Route 4018 (Meadowcraft Road) in Jefferson and Independence townships between Village Road and Fallen Timber Road.
In Fayette County, closed roads are:
Route 2011 (Dinner Bell Five Forks Road/Dinner Bell Ohiopyle Road) in Stewart township between Meadow Run Road and Ohiopyle Road
Route 4038 (Layton Bridge) in Perry Township.
A message on the West Penn Power website stated that crews were making significant progress assessing damage and making repairs to restore power to all affected customers.
“Please remember to treat all downed lines as live and dangerous and stay at least 30 feet away from them and anything they may be touching,” the message said.