2004 Year in Review

1,583 left without power from storm

Com Ed employees work to restore lines

Brad Blean cleans up branches

Barb Geerts rakes branches on her driveway

Tree down on East Wall Street

Genesee Avenue wasn’t buzzing this morning with school traffic but instead it was the buzz of chain saws and trucks.

Last night’s storm brought down trees and wires on Genesee Avenue and Wall Street and littered streets and yards with branches all over town.

“There was a big flash that lit up the room then we could hear the wind,” said Barb Geerts as she and her husband Neil were cleaning up their yard. “I thought it was the end of the world, but by the time I grabbed clothes it was all over except for some wind and the rain. We didn’t even have time to get to the basement. I thought something fell on our house, but I think it was just the sound of the tree going down across the street.”

The tree across the street brought down power lines and had Com Ed and city workers working to get branches cut up and power restored.

Junee Cortes said Friday morning, “I’ve been up all night. About 12:30 I thought someone was breaking into my house. There was a big crack and then the tree dominoed into the one next to it.” The tree she was talking about was one on East Wall Street, which had that street blocked until city workers removed it yet last night.

Genesee Avenue was totally blocked off and school traffic had to be rerouted through Academic Drive.

According to a spokesperson from Commonwealth Edison 1,583 customers were without power in the Morrison area.

by Dawn Zuidema, theCity1.com
August 27, 2004