Brutal storm leaves Carroll County community in shambles
BALTIMORE -- Carroll County residents are still talking about a ruthless storm that tore down limbs, damaged homes and knocked out power Monday evening.
"I'm 87 years old, but I've never in my life experienced anything like that," Charlotte Calhoun said.
A torrential downpour and damaging winds scared Carroll County residents.
"The rain started coming down, and the wind," Sheri Mako said. "I have never seen wind like that before."
There was even a Tornado Warning at one point.
"I heard the whistle blow, the train whistle," Calhoun said. "I'm like, that's a train whistle. I jerked open my curtain in my living room and I seen the big tree right across the road just fall."
The Tornado Warning forced residents in Manchester to seek shelter in their basement.
"We just heard a bunch of rumbling sounds and the whole entire house was shaking," said Vayda Zeher.
Mako said Monday's storm was one of the scariest things she has lived through.
"I was really worried that something was going to come through the house," she said.
Mako's yard is now filled with debris from the storm.
Next door, Chelsea Zeher considered herself lucky that the damage to her home wasn't worse.
"If you look at the way it's angled, there is such a huge chance that would have landed on the house if it would have broken any lower," she said.
Vickie Rivera, who lives across the street from Calhoun, said a tree hit close to her home.
"Momma made us go in the house, you know how momma's got that momma tone," Rivera said. "Went in the house and, of course, I'm a cross-the-line kind of kid. I'm standing in the window when the wind just busted loose and this tree was coming at me."
And now, like many others in this community, the cleanup effort begins.
But for Rivera, this storm was particularly devastating.
"I don't know how much more I can take," Rivera said. "My husband has terminal bone cancer, my stepfather has stage three lung cancer that we just found out about yesterday and we came home, just got in the house, thank God we were in the house, for this to start."
In other parts of Carroll County, 33 adults and 14 children were trapped in their cars after a storm knocked over 30 utility poles in Westminster.
RELATED COVERAGE
