Storms pummel northern Westchester, about 30 downed trees in Somers
A spokesperson from the National Weather Service says that radar and available observational evidence points toward straight-line winds and a microburst.
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The clean-up is on in northern Westchester, where intense winds took down trees, took out power and damaged homes and cars.
"It was a lot crazier than we expected, but everyone's safe," said Bryan Aryee, whose home was hit by a giant uprooted tree. "It looked like it was raining sideways."
At about 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Aryee and his father took shelter downstairs and heard a loud bang upstairs near the room where they had just been.
"We see the tree just hanging off the roof, and we're like 'OK, it's worse than we thought,'" he said. "We come outside. Look to our right. There's a tree down. Look to our left. There's another tree down. We're stuck."
At least three homes and a few cars were damaged in the Shenorock neighborhood off Route 118.
Immediately following the storm, 12,000 NYSEG customers were without power. NYSEG line workers brought that number down significantly overnight.
Officials from the Somers Highway Department said at least 30 trees were brought down, some blocking roads and others hitting roofs.
High school sophomore Tyler Phillips showed News 12 around his neighborhood, where trees blocked the road and narrowly missed his home. His mother's Toyota Rav 4, though, was completely buried by a tree that blocked the road.
"Yeah, so the car's bad, but at least no one got hurt," he said.
Somers Town Supervisor Robert Scorrano confirmed there were no injuries as a result of the storm. Scorrano told News 12 that town officials, police, highway department and the local fire district quickly cleared enough roads allowing everyone to get out of their neighborhoods.
He said the community's storm response system worked.
"This was one of those storms that was unplanned for," he said. "The response time has been incredible from all facets, like I said, and be patient. We're working on it as fast as we can, and we hope to get restored power here in the next day or so."
Homeowners are now waiting for insurance adjusters to survey the damage to their homes and for tree services to remove and chop the trees still resting on their roofs.
