MENTOR, Ohio — Thousands of people in Northeast Ohio are still without power Monday, after a confirmed 11 tornadoes hit communities across the area Thursday night going into Friday.
One of those 11 twisters tore through the city of Mentor in Lake County.
"Then before we knew it, the power was cut and I've never seen my wife move so fast, grabbing our daughter and running downstairs," Ian Neale told 3News.
Lake County Emergency Management reports an early Friday EF-1 Tornado uprooted trees and ripped out power lines, leaving residents like Neale and Robin Tagliamonte without electricity.
"You never think that you'll have to experience it yourself," Tagliamonte said. "We've lived here 65 years, and we've never seen anything like this. We've had storms, but not like this, where there's so much structural damage to many houses and where the expense of tree removal is just overwhelming for many of us."
Tagliamonte tells us a fallen tree crashed into his roof, but his neighbors had it even worse.
"The tree came right through their roof and struck their son while he was sleeping," he shared. "Luckily, he was just hit in the foot and got a sprained ankle and went to the hospital and he was fine, but it was terrifying of course for them. They're still shook up."
The cost of tree removal looms heavy.
"Insurance won't pay for this cleanup," Neale said, with so many trees and branches in his front yard that he couldn't see the street from his house window. "The quotes have been around $20,000 to $25,000 to get these three trees cleaned up in the front and that doesn't even talk about the back."
Thankfully for his family, his church is rolling up its sleeves to help him remove as many trees as possible, to get the cost of professional service reduced.
"It's been amazing to see our community come together, the people come together here, and just the ways that they've been able to support each other and help us all kind of get through this," he said optimistically.
Monday afternoon, FirstEnergy told 3News that 3,100 customers in Lake County were still without power. They hope the majority of them will get it back by Wednesday.
The city of Mentor is doing curbside removal of branches that are six inches or less in diameter starting Tuesday, but for branches bigger than that they say arrangements will have to be made through private contractors.
Previous Reporting:
- Thousands still without power after strong storms hit Northeast Ohio last week: FirstEnergy offering free water, ice to those affected by outages
- Tornado total climbs to 11 in Northeast Ohio: EF-1 twister in Bainbridge latest confirmed from last week's severe storms
- ‘Significant storm damage’: National Weather Service confirms EF-1 tornado in Mentor