Severe storms roll through area
By Bonnie Edwards
Published in News on June 6, 2004 2:02 AM
The National Weather Service received several reports about a tornado that touched down around noon Friday near the Nahunta area.
Doug Schneider said the official report came in from law enforcement, but he said several people reported spotting it.
"From information we received, no structures were damaged," he said. "It just knocked down some trees."
The Weather Service issued a severe storm warning at 1 p.m. for Mount Olive and the southern part of the county. At 3:15 p.m., the service issued a flash flood warning for southern Wayne. A tornado watch was in effect from 1 p.m. until 5 p. m.
Rainfall reached 1.59 inches at the observer site around 5 p.m., but the radar estimate for the southern part of the county, which doesn't have an observer site, was about 3 inches.
Johnny Talton with the Wayne 911 center said no calls came in about damage or flooding from the storm. "It was an easy day," he said.
Joe Gurley, director of Wayne Emergency Services, said the county was very fortunate to have come through with no damage with so many funnel clouds reported. "We had reports of seven, but none of them ever touched down," he said.
Jimmy Pate with Duplin County Emergency Services said no damage occurred there. Lots of rain fell in some places, like Mount Olive and Warsaw, but not in Calypso. "It sort of split up when it got to us," he said.
Durwood Smith said Tri-County Electric Membership Corporation had several power outages in the Mount Olive area. But the storm went through so fast, he said, only about 30 customers were out for around 20 minutes. "We were real blessed with this storm," he said.