Damaging Storms Move Through The Region
FEASTERVILLE, Pa., (CBS) -- Damaging storms moved through the region Tuesday.
A tree fell onto a house in Feasterville, Bucks County.
"It just smashed everything up."
The back of Raymond Engle's home is on the verge of collapse after high wind and soggy soil caused a large tree to crash down like a cleaver and basically quarter the house.
"I watched the tree, I looked at it and I was checking it, started to go over and I just said to myself, 'there it goes.' And I was probably 10, 15 feet away from where it actually hit."
If it fell on a lightly different angle:
"I would have been buried with tree limbs and whatever else, and probably parts of the house because it came down," said Engle.
Witnesses say the sudden wind episode happened right around noon. It appears concentrated on a several block area in Feasterville off Bustleton Pike near Woodland Road. Material flew off of the roof of a tile business and a section of shingles about the size of a mattress were ripped off Elsie McDonough's roof.
"We have a section of our roof that was torn off. And the tree going down, it was a little scary," said McDonough.
Lower Southampton Township Public Works were able to quickly remove the downed tree that fell from McDonough's yard across the side street.
Engle's situation could take several weeks or longer to repair and despite the near death experience, he seems to be taking it all in stride.
(Reporter:) "You are very calm about this."
"What can I do? It's done. There's nothing I can do. I just hope everything gets cleared up quickly and efficiently, I hope so anyway," he said.
Damage was also reported in other parts of the area.
Chopper 3 was over the Holmesburg Boys Club in Northeast Philadelphia where part of the roof was ripped off. No one was injured.
In New Jersey, the scoreboard blew down at Gloucester City High School in Camden County. Wind gusts over 50 miles an hour were reported in area.
The winds also took off the roof of a dairy barn in Richboro in Bucks County. Lenny Tanner's family owns the dairy farm. Almost 400 cows live in the barn, but none were hurt. Tanner plans to rebuild the barn.
"I guess the timing was right and nobody was in harm's way," Tanner told Eyewitness News.
