The storm brought strong winds, heavy rain and hail, wreaking havoc on the roads as many commuters headed home at the end of the day. Traffic on M-25 in Sebewaing was detoured late Tuesday afternoon because a power line had fallen across the road. Motorists reported hail west of Bad Axe, frequent lightning strikes, strong winds, heavy rain and tree limbs and debris littering the ground.
Phillip Crown was at his home near Elkton Tuesday afternoon when he heard things moving on his porch. He opened the front door and saw his patio furniture “spinning around.” He grabbed his daughter and walked away from the windows as he listened to the storm ravage his home. It didn’t last very long, though.
“Two minutes at most,” he said.
When the storm passed, he and his wife, Holly, were able to assess the damage. His pickup truck had been crushed by a tree and his motorcycle was buried under a pile of branches. Branches were everywhere and a downed power line was in his yard.
Fortunately, the Crowns’ home sustained only minor damage, but the cornfields surrounding their home were flattened in places and items from the porch were scattered behind the house. The Crowns said they are thankful that everyone was safe and their home sustained only minor damage.
Sheriff Kelly Hanson said his patrol officers were busy Thursday night but no injuries were reported, adding that buoys on Lake Huron west of Sebewaing recorded wind gusts in excess of 40 mph.
DTE Energy promised its affected customers that power would be restored by Thursday or Friday. The DTE outage map showed a concentration of homes without power in the Sebewaing and Caseville areas, but outages were reported throughout Huron County.
DTE customers were asked to report downed power lines on its website. According to an outage map, over 216,000 DTE customers nationwide were without power as of 10 p.m. Tuesday. The east side of the state, including the Detroit metropolitan area, was hardest hit by the storm Tuesday afternoon.
Access to Sand Point was temporarily closed early Tuesday evening due to a small fire sparked by a downed power line on Crescent Beach Road.
The storm also forced the cancellation of the boys soccer game between the Bad Axe and Lakers teams scheduled for Tuesday night.
A post on the Tuscola County Emergency Services Facebook page said that in the hours following the storm, which required the deployment of emergency personnel from all of the county’s fire departments, only two operators handled dozens of calls.
“We are glad the storm has passed and we are all out there assessing the damage and keeping everyone safe,” the post said. “Between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m., our center received a total of 79 emergency calls. The average time for a call is nearly four minutes to collect, process and dispatch the appropriate resources. Keep in mind that many of these calls require multiple resources from multiple agencies.”
