Wind causes modest damage
Trees, wires downed as highest gust registers at 52 mph
Richard Vance, a sales clerk at Surplus City, took this photo of damage caused by high winds on Saturday. Courtesy photo
Wind blew a 12-by-12 foot section of the roof of the Pleasant Valley Recreation Center into this home across the street along South Jaggard Street. Mirror photo by William Kibler
Richard Vance, a sales clerk at Surplus City, took this photo of damage caused by high winds on Saturday. Courtesy photo
Wind blew a 12-by-12 foot section of the roof of the Pleasant Valley Recreation Center into this home across the street along South Jaggard Street. Mirror photo by William Kibler
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Strong winds Saturday afternoon tore off part of a roof in Altoona and part of a roof in Antis Township, but otherwise created problems that were limited to downed trees and wires and the closure of roads, according to sources on Sunday.
The gusts were caused by thunderstorms atop an already windy weather system that was created by the "sharp" difference between a low pressure area to the north and a high pressure area to the south, said meteorologist Barry Lambert of the National Weather Service in State College.
The maximum reported gust in Blair County was 52 mph in Altoona, although one of 68 mph was registered by a weather vane atop Beaver Stadium in Centre County, Lambert said.
Fortunately, there wasn't enough moisture left in the atmosphere in the region for development of more severe thunderstorms that could have caused worse damage, Lambert said.
"We were lucky, with that amount of wind energy" contained in the larger high-versus-low pressure systems, Lambert said. "It could have been a lot worse."
In the city, the wind blew an approximately 12-foot-by-12-foot and a six-foot-by-six-foot section off an apartment building above the bowling alley at the Recreation Center -- causing perhaps $30,000 to $40,000 damage, according to center Manager Tony Montgomery.
The removal of the roof sections didn't affect the operations of the bowling alley or the 4D's Lounge, and it didn't render the apartments uninhabitable -- as the sloped roof had been installed atop an existing rubber roof about 15 years ago, Montgomery said.
The wind blew the 12-by-12 foot section across South Jaggard Street onto a neighboring house, damaging an awning and railing, Montgomery said. The Recreation Center has insurance, Montgomery said.
In Antis Township, the wind rolled up the front section of the metal roof on a Surplus City warehouse, according to Richard Vance, a sales clerk at the business.
Everyone inside the store at the time thought the noise it made was thunder, until customers came in and said, "'Oh my God, your roof blew off!'" Vance said.
The section was about 100 feet from left to right and about 18 feet from top to bottom, Vance estimated.
Company officials were checking out the contents of the warehouse Sunday, Vance said. The firm has insurance, he said.
The widespread winds led to a loss of power for 132,000 customers in Penelec's service area in central, northwest and northeast Pennsylvania at the height of the outages, said company spokesman Josh Duke.
He had no statistics specific to Blair County, as Blair was not considered one of the "problem areas," Duke said.
The number of customers out of service as of mid-afternoon Sunday in the Penelec system was 30,000, Duke said.
At that time, crews were still clearing hazards and assessing damage, he said.
The Altoona Fire Department received about 15 calls for storm damage, mostly "wires down and trees down," said Assistant Chief Kelly Dilling.
A dislodged wire set a hollow, rotten tree on fire on the 5500 block of Third Avenue, Dilling said.
"A non-typical call," he said.
The fire didn't damage the wire or even take it out of service, he said.
Beyond Blair County, the wind rolled a single-wide mobile home in Cameron County onto a road, Lambert said.
Terrain can affect wind speed, with hills and depressions sometimes exerting "squeeze," like liquid coming from a larger into a smaller pipe, Lambert said.
The wind also tilted a tractor-trailer traveling on a highway in the Philipsburg area onto nine wheels, rather than the full 18, as witnessed by a NWS staffer on the way to work, Lambert said.
Wind can "play havoc" with high-profile, lightly loaded vehicles, Lambert said.
Logan Township Emergency Management Coordinator Jeff Blake was "sitting with my fingers crossed" during the windy period yesterday, he said.
The township's fire departments answered multiple calls for trees down, but there was nothing "out of the ordinary," Blake said.
"No reports of structural damage," he stated. "I kinda like (it)."