BATAVIA – A powerful storm swept through Batavia shortly after 2:30 p.m. on Sunday afternoon, causing significant damage.
The storm brought damaging winds and hail, causing multiple trees to fall, branches and limbs toppling over onto houses and cars, and mailboxes to be ripped out of the ground.
Winds gusted up to 80 mph in Batavia, Illinois, which borders Kane and DuPage counties.
“We rushed to the basement and avoided the windows. We immediately heard all of the cracking around us. “We have never seen weather like this before,” Nick Duda stated.
Duda claims his family lost most of their trees and some windows in the storm, and their power is completely out.
“We were not home. My neighbour called and said, ‘You might want to come home, there is a tree on your house.'” Emily Nicholson said.
Nicholson’s back deck was flattened by trees, and a hole in the roof allowed water to flood the house. She asked her friend Elizabeth to come over.
“She said, ‘My house is ruined,’ and I assumed she was kidding. She can be dramatic, but she is serious. “Her house is under three trees,” Elizabeth explained.
Those caught behind the wheel as the storm unfolded faced extremely low visibility on the roads, as power lines were snapped by the wind.
Crews are currently out fixing power lines and starting the cleanup process. Earlier today, there were 50 reported outages in the area, affecting approximately 3,000 customers.
There have been no reported injuries at this time.
In true community fashion, neighbors are already out with chainsaws, offering assistance to those chopping down fallen limbs and branches.
