Wild storm slams region

Thu, June 28, 2007

By PATRICK MALONEY AND JOE MATYAS, SUN MEDIA

A vicious storm hammered the region yesterday, darkening sunny skies in minutes with driving rain, lightning and a reported funnel cloud.

The storm, which downed trees and power lines and left thousands without electricity, quickly cooled down a region baking in a 30-degree heat wave, and was expected to drop up to 40 mm of rain before the disturbance passed.

While the nasty weather ushered in summer vacation in the worst way for school kids, it was a relief for area farmers suffering through a recent, drought-like dry spell.

“We’ve lost some yields on all crops,” said Kerwood farmer Steve Fonger, president of the Middlesex Federation of Agriculture. “Rain that gets down to the plant roots would limit that damage that’s already been done and improve the outlook.”

Mary Whetstone’s outlook — from the front porch of her London home — was definitely not improved when the afternoon storm struck.

A three-storey maple tree in her Elias Street front yard was cleaved down the middle, apparently hit by lightning, as if cut by a giant axe, and fell onto her neighbour’s house.

The tree went through the roof and collapsed the small porch of the house, while taking down power lines. The neighbours weren’t home and no one was reported hurt.

The fallen tree also blocked Whetstone into her house.

“It sounded like it was coming down the roof,” she said. “I never thought this one would come down.”

The tree’s split trunk appeared charred inside.

“I saw a great, big orange glow . . . right here,” said Helen Horvath, who was driving nearby. “It scared me.”

Other trees and powerlines were downed across London.

Outside the city, an estimated 6,000 Hydro One customers were left in the dark in Lambton County, Strathroy, Walkerton and Listowel.

Television reports showed a funnel cloud over the Sarnia area as the storm hit, but there were no confirmed reports of a touchdown.

The storm brought desperately-needed rain for crops teetering on the edge of major losses in parched fields, after a month with less than half the average amount of rainfall.

Source: The London Free Press