Thunderstorm Wind — Sandusky, Ohio

2013-07-10 · near Gibsonburg, Sandusky, Ohio

Event narrative

A line of thunderstorms producing winds in excess of 70 mph raced east across Seneca County causing significant damage. Thousands of trees and limbs were downed across the county and large swaths of corn were flattened in fields. Nearly every community in the county sustained damage and hundreds of homes and buildings were damaged. Over two dozen farm buildings were leveled in the county. The Bellevue area was especially hard hit with damage reported on nearly every street. At least a half dozen homes in the city were heavily damaged by fallen trees and dozens of others sustained lesser damage, mainly from lost roofing or siding. Businesses on Main Street had windows blown out and nearly the entire town lost power for an extended period. It took almost five days for power to be fully restored. Houses were also heavily damaged by fallen trees in Fremont and Clyde. Many vehicles were damaged as well. Scattered damage was also observed in the rural portions of the county. Power outages affecting traffic signals and roads closed by downed trees severely hampered travel in the county after this storm. At least four people had to rescued after they became stranded in their vehicles by downed power lines. U.S Route 20 was closed in several locations. Clean up costs from this storm were substantial. Ten townships, four villages and two cities applied for nearly $1 million in disaster relief.

Wider weather episode

A hot and humid airmass over the Ohio Valley was broken up on the 10th by a shortwave trough and a surface cold front that came moved through during the afternoon hours. Storms developed ahead of the cold front around noon, and ended with the exit of the cold front through northwest Pennsylvania around 7 pm. The humid and unstable airmass supported intense rainfall rates verified with reports of 0.75 in 15 minutes. These storms moved over an area that was already saturated from weeks of hit and miss storms and floods, and could not support the additional runoff produced during this event. The result was widespread flash flooding as the storms affected every county in the WFO Cleveland county warning area.

In addition to the flooding, widespread severe weather including three tornadoes occurred on July 10th. A line of intense thunderstorms developed ahead of the advancing cold front during the afternoon hours. Thunderstorm wind gusts in excess of 70 mph were reported. Seneca and Sandusky Counties in north central Ohio were especially hard hit. Thousands of downed trees and widespread power outages were reported. The Bellevue area was especially hard by the combination of straight line winds and a weak tornado. Nearly every street in the city had damage of some sort and it took five days for power to be restored to the majority of the city. Another tornado formed in northeastern Seneca County and moved in Huron County. A third tornado affected portions of rural Ashland County. Large swaths of corn were flattened across northern Ohio and nearly every county reported severe weather. As many as 250,000 electric customers lost power during this evening.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (41.3800, -83.4072)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 462670. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.