High winds cause power outages and property destruction as wild March weather blows in
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Hundreds of thousands of people were left without power Saturday after strong winds blew eastward from the Great Lakes region, leaving downed trees and widespread property damage in their wake.
Nearly 600,000 customers were still affected as of midday in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan, according to PowerOutage.us, which tracks outages nationwide.
A gust of 66 mph (106 kph) at Pittsburgh International Airport on Friday was considered the fourth strongest on record that was not caused by a thunderstorm, according to the National Weather Service. Cleveland Burke Lakefront Airport saw winds reach 85 miles (137 km) Friday afternoon.
Winds tore down the awning of a gas station in New Franklin, Ohio, and the sign of an auto parts store in Baldwin, Pennsylvania. Trees and tree limbs fell into or onto homes and cars from Cleveland to Pittsburgh. The roof of a school building in Niles, a suburb of Chicago, Illinois, was severely damaged by wind.
High winds fueled several wildfires across a wide swath of Nebraska’s range and grasslands, causing one death in Arthur County, officials said. The victim was not immediately identified and the sheriff’s office did not release further details about the death.
What state officials have dubbed the Morrill County Fire has burned at least 708 square miles (about 1,834 square kilometers) in four counties since Thursday. At least 12 structures were destroyed, according to the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency.
The dangerous winds are just one piece of a wild weather mosaic that includes heavy rain in Hawaii, triple-digit heat coming to Phoenix and the return of winter cold across the Midwest and Northeast. Chicago was expected to approach single digits Fahrenheit by Tuesday, while Minneapolis was expected to see lows around zero (minus 18 C).
Several Minnesota cities have already declared snow emergencies starting Sunday, when what could be the heaviest snowfall of the season is expected to fall. Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula are also in the crosshairs.
AccuWeather describes conditions as a “powerful triple threat March megastorm” from Sunday to Monday.
“It’s definitely a very active weather weekend, that’s for sure,” said John Feerick, AccuWeather senior meteorologist. “It’s a very amplified model, which means you get a lot of extremes. Also, not just the Lower 48, but Hawaii is being hit hard right now with very heavy rain.”
Feerick said residents along the Wisconsin-Iowa border could see ice as travel conditions become dangerous in large parts of the Upper Midwest.
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Beck reported from Omaha, Nebraska.
