Powerful Storm Batters Flatonia
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Flatonia’s Mike Steinhauser points to how the roof of his law office downtown was peeled off by powerful winds Thursday night. Photo by Jeff Wick -
R.J. Steinhauser was helping his brother Mike clean out his rain-soaked law office after the roof blew off Thursday. Here he throws piles of soaked drywall and other debris on the sidewalk outside the office. Photo by Jeff Wick
Mike Steinhauser is an optimist.
His law office in down-town Flatonia sustained lots of water damage Thursday after a powerful storm peeled off part of the roof above the historic 150-year-old building.
“At least we got rain,” Steinhauser said.
A century-old oak fell in his back yard during the storm. “But it missed the house,” he said.
Steinhauser was quick to find the silver linings, but parts of Flatonia were a mess Friday morning as city crews were out and about cleaning up.
City manager Sonya Bishop said some residents reported seeing a funnel cloud, but whether it was a tornado or just straight line winds Thursday night, she said powerful gusts knocked down lots of trees and power lines and damaged some roofs around town.
“It’s bad,” Bishop said. Bishop said she knew of no injuries related to the storm, which dumped a couple of inches on a drought stricken Flatonia. Other areas of Fayette County received widely varied amounts of rain. Carmine got nearly three inches of rain Thursday, while Mullins Prairie got just two-tenths.
Most areas of La Grange got about half-an-inch.
Scattered showers continued Friday and Saturday across Fayette County.
Back in Flatonia Friday morning, Mike and his brother R.J. Steinhauser and a host of others were carrying a steady stream of trash bags full of rain-soaked insulation and dry wall down the stairs – enough to make a small hill of trash on the sidewalk. The damaged roof was shared by Steinhauser’s office at 107 East N. Main and Tammy Collins’ 109 East. North Main storefront.
Across Main Street more debris stood, left behind by the storm, including broken pieces of cinder block (Steinhauser had no idea where those could have blown in from), a sign of just how strong the storm had been.