'Unbelievable' damage after wind prompted tornado warnings
ST. FRANCIS, Wis. - A wild round of storms Tuesday night, Nov. 10 led to plenty of work cleaning up on Wednesday.
At LarryVille Gardens in Spring Prairie in Walworth County, the storms didn't spare one of the vegetable farm's large greenhouses, lifting it up off its foundation and uprooting rutabagas, along with it.
People from Fontana to Franklin to St. Francis spent the day Wednesday cleaning up damage from high wind.
"This was something I hadn’t seen before," said Michelle Cannon, LarryVille Gardens.
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Cannon's used to paying close attention to the weather and the wind -- the sound of flapping plastic means there's a problem.
"Actually, I didn’t go to sleep because I could hear plastic flapping," said Cannon.
Tree downed in Waterford due to severe weather on Tuesday, Nov. 10.
As it turned out, there was a big one. The large hoop house in her backyard was uprooted from its anchors, uprooting rutabagas along with it.
"It harvested all the rutabagas for us," said Cannon. "You can see baby rutabagas right there. Harvested all of them, pulled them out of the ground. It’s — at least this part is kind of safe.”
The wind was strong enough to lift up the structure and move it about 15 feet to the north, with kale, previously untouched, inside the mangled mess of aluminum and cables a day later.
"That was outside yesterday,” said Cannon.
Severe weather, winds cause damage in Walworth County
Tornado watches and two warnings (for Walworth and Kenosha counties) partnered with the strong line of severe thunderstorms moving through the southeastern portion of the state ripped up rain and wind from Franklin to Fontana.
On Wednesday, lawn and public works crews chopped off downed limbs, with daylight revealing some of the damage.
"This is unbelievable," said Jennifer Polinski in St. Francis. "We’ve had downed branches before, but nothing like this."
Severe weather, winds cause damage in Walworth County
Polinski was working in her home office when the storm front ripped through, leaving her backyard a mess of partially cut up trees and limbs, and neighbors untouched.
"My husband’s main job today was trying to get the fire pit unburied so we could start burning some stuff," said Polinski.
At Cannon's farm in Walworth County, she said she's thankful there was no real damage to crops, but noted it would be a lot of work to clean it all up with winter coming.
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