No clear skies yet for Butler County
Parker resident Julie Weigel was one of dozens of residents surveying the damage and starting the process of cleaning up after strong storms, and possibly a tornado, ripped through Parker late Sunday afternoon.
“You could see a rotation cloud with debris up in the sky,” Weigel said of looking outside just before she and her family took cover in the basement. “It was very localized.”
The storm uprooted several large trees lining Weigel's backyard, taking down power lines and a transformer with them and destroying her husband's truck.
Across the street, her neighbors Mike and Heather Bucholz cleared debris from a large tree in their front yard that landed on their home after being ripped from the ground by the strong winds.
“We got here like five minutes after it happened,” Heather Bucholz said. “We didn't know anything about it until we got here. It was that quick. Our kid's swing set ended on the neighbor's back porch.”
Another neighbor, June McKee, was also being assisted by friends and community members. She and her husband, who is in a wheelchair, saw the funnel cloud barreling toward their home and business, Parker Storage. She said they had just seconds to take shelter by the first floor stairs of their home because they didn't have enough time to get to the basement.
“It all just happened very, very fast,” McKee said as she looked at the damaged storage units behind her home. “I looked up that hill and said 'Look at that rain coming' to my husband, and about that time the wind picked up. I bet it wasn't 30 seconds.”
Much of Western Pennsylvania remained under a hazardous weather outlook Sunday night. The advisory means there existed the possibility of isolated severe thunderstorms with damaging winds, according to the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh.Areas of Butler County experienced severe weather Sunday in the wake of those tornado warnings issued by the National Weather Service.Multiple structures were reportedly damaged in the area of Parker Pike in Parker Township, according to authorities.Multiple trees and power lines were reported down. The Bruin Volunteer Fire Department was on the scene just before 7 p.m.The National Weather Service allowed tornado warnings for northeastern Butler County and southeastern Mercer County to expire at 6:45 p.m. Sunday.But the weather service warned, “Isolated flooding is also possible mainly in areas that typically see rapid runoff with heavier rainfall.”
The chance of isolated severe thunderstorms and localized flooding will continue Monday and Tuesday.The reason for the storms is a stationary front of mixed cold and warm air that is oscillating over the area, said John Darnley, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.“It's along I-80 (Interstate 80) and just south of I-80, and this is where storms are pulsing along this front,” he said.“We have unconfirmed reports of tornadoes. We are going to send out a team tomorrow to assess damage and assign wind speed,” said Darnley.The storms, which ran in a line from Parker to Rimersburg, brought with them between half and three-quarters of an inch of rain.And the rain might continue to fall at the beginning of the workweek, Darnley said.Eagle Managing Editor Andie Hannon contributed to this story.
