A thunderstorm moved through Butler and surrounding counties Sunday afternoon, damaging homes and leaving behind downed trees, blocked roadways and power outages.
No injuries were reported, but an estimated 12,000 Ozark Border Electric Cooperative members still were without power at about 3:30 p.m. Sunday. About 3,100 customers remained out of power as of Monday morning.
The thunderstorm caused “straight-line wind damage, a lot of it,” according to the National Weather Service in Paducah, Kentucky. There were no reports of any tornadic activity.
The storm hit Van Buren in Carter County at about 12:45 p.m.
“It looked like a hurricane, sheets of rain and wind,” said Gary Sullivan, a dispatcher with the Carter County Sheriff’s Department. “It wasn’t a noisy storm. There wasn’t any thunder and lightning, just wind and rain.”
The “main cell,” according to Carter County Sheriff Rick Stephens, lasted about 45 minutes, with “heavy, heavy rain (and) heavy, heavy wind.”
In its aftermath were a lot of downed trees countywide and power outages. This included the Fremont and Van Buren areas early Sunday afternoon, with power lines down in Ellsinore, Sullivan said.
“We had a few people trapped with trees down on M Highway,” Stephens said Sunday, indicating motorists got stranded on the road between fallen trees.
People, Sullivan said, also were trapped by trees at Watercress Park in Van Buren. First responders were called to remove the debris.
As the storm moved into Butler and Wayne counties, the high winds caused more downed trees.
“Right now, there are trees down pretty much countywide in different places,” said Butler County Emergency Management Agency Director Robbie Myers on Sunday afternoon. “We’ve had multiple reports of roof damage,” including at Neelyville.
The roof was “completely blown off of a house in Neelyville, one mile south of Highway 142 on (Highway) 67,” said Craig Meador with the Poplar Bluff Severe Weather Response Team.
A tree, Meador said, also fell on a home at 117 W. Center St., trapping a resident inside.
Poplar Bluff Fire Capt. Jeff Hale said firefighters found a tree had fallen on the home, “pushing the roof and tree itself down on top of a bed where a girl was laying.
“We cut the roof out from underneath the tree, (then) cut a hole for the girl to crawl out of.”
The girl, who was believed to be a teenager, was taken by ambulance for treatment, but “I don’t believe she was injured,” Hale said.
The Center Street home was one of four that firefighters responded to regarding trees having fallen on houses, Hale said.
A building at Gamblin Lumber on the Peach Street also was damaged by the high winds.
The official wind speed at the Poplar Bluff Regional Business Airport was reported at 66 mph.
Crews, Myers said, worked Sunday afternoon to remove trees from the roads in Butler County.
There were numerous reports of downed trees near the Butler/Wayne County line.
At one point, Meador said, trees were down, blocking the southbound lanes of Highway 67, one mile south of York Village.
“So far, I’ve got trees down basically on the western and southern half of Wayne County,” said Sheriff Dean Finch on Sunday afternoon. “Trees are down across V Highway, and one down in Piedmont,” as well as down on Highway W.
“In the Piedmont area, they are cutting the trees down there out of the road,” Finch said.
Missouri Department of Transportation crews, Finch said, were en route mid-afternoon Sunday “to take care of all the other” roads.
Finch said he had no reports of injuries or damage.
“My chief deputy lost his flag pole in his front yard; (the winds) bent it over,” Finch added.
Missouri State Highway Patrol troopers in Troop E were on the scene of multiple trees down over the road after the “strong line of storms moved through Wayne and Butler County” Sunday afternoon, said Sgt. Clark Parrott, Troop E’s public information officer.
A couple of vehicles, Parrott said, also were damaged by trees, but “no injuries or structural damage” was reported.
In Ripley County, Meador said, there were reports of lots of trees down and some scattered power outages.
“We’ve got roughly a third of our system off, about 12,000 are off right now,” said David Schremp, Ozark Border’s general manager, on Sunday afternoon.
The outages, he said, are in “every county. It started out with our power supplier losing power to five of our substations, and then the storm moved through our area, (causing) extensive damage, mostly trees on the lines and broken poles.”
The AT&T phone system in the area, according to Schremp, has been overloaded, making it “hard for our members to get a hold of us.”
Schremp said he had employees standing by to answer the phones, but no calls were coming through.
In the city of Poplar Bluff, Municipal Utilities General Manager Bill Bach said, the first outages were reported at 1:37 p.m.
“We were just over 300; we’re down to 40,” Bach said at about 4:35 p.m. Sunday. “We should have them on in the next 45 minutes.”
The outages, Bach said, were scattered in town.
In Stoddard County, Sheriff Carl Hefner said, they had a “few trees down, a few power lines down” countywide.
“I don’t know of any buildings that are down right now,” Hefner said just before 4 p.m.
In Ripley County, Sheriff Mike Barton said, there were a few trees down around the county in the areas of Highway E and CC, as well as a couple on the Ripley Lake Road, located on Highway C at Highway JJ, and at the end of Highway M.
Barton said he was unaware of any reports of major damage.
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