Community continues to recover from tornadic weather

Power companies nearly have the area back up after a succession of dangerous storms hit the Cass County area starting on Wednesday, June 14 leaving many without power. On the heels of those storms, the area experienced a heatwave leaving some without power to fend off the hot weather. In response to the disaster declaration emergency medical personnel came in from outside the area to assist the elderly and vulnerable that could have been affected by the storm. Cleanup efforts continue moving debris and damage to the area.

Last week on Wednesday, the National Weather Service (NWS) in Shreveport confirmed that the northern portion of Queen City received damage from an EF2 Tornado. According to the NWS at the time, “In a very unstable and unusually strongly sheared June environment, a large and long-lived supercell thunderstorm developed near a frontal boundary. The storm produced large hail, damaging winds, and a tornado.”

“The tornado initially produced damage along the shore of Wright Patman Lake. It snapped and uprooted hundreds of hardwood and softwood trees along its path, first crossing CR 3555. After it Crossed CR 3555, it peeled part of a roof off of a single-family home. The tornado continued to snap and uproot trees as it paralleled CR 3555 and crossed CR 3551 and CR 3554. The tornado strengthened to EF-2 intensity as it crossed CR 3659 and produced more widespread snapping of trees.

“As the tornado continued on, its most intense damage was at a two-story industrial facility along us-59. The tornado tore off the roof and damaged the walls of the facility, bending and breaking parts of the metal frame of its roof structure.

“After crossing us-59 and tossing vehicles, the tornado snapped more trees on the other side of the road. The tornado weakened some with more uprooting and sporadic tree snaps as it crossed FM-2327, CR3781, CR-3778, FM-3129, and CR-3886. It finally lifted as it crossed cr-3889 as damage transitioned to all straight-line wind damage with winds estimated at 80 to 90 mph as the storm continued to the border of Cass County, Texas and Miller County, Arkansas.”

As a result of the damages to the County, Judge Travis Ransom issued a disaster declaration. A letter from Ransom’s office was also sent to the Governor’s office informing the Texas Governor of the devastation caused by the storms. On June 16, the Governor wrote a proclamation on Friday, June 16, 2023, certifying the severe weather and tornadoes that began on June 14, 2023.

As towns, cities, counties, and state personnel begin the cleanup effort it can be confusing to know who does what after storms ravage an area. When clearing the roads, the county is in charge of clearing the county roads, and the state is in charge of clearing out the state highways. Roads will always be cleared by public health priority.

It should be noted that individuals are responsible for their own. When experiencing damage, the first phone call should be to your insurance company to see what is covered. Those impacted by the storm are encouraged to fill out the iSTAT form: https://damage.tdem. texas.gov. Ransom told the Journal-Sun that those who fill out the form will be put on a list of people needing assistance from non-profit organizations sent out to help those impacted. Places like churches are a good resource to get help if you are unable to clean up the damage safely. They may know of people in their congregation to help. Ransom is also encouraging people willing to aid call his office.

It should be noted that any time there are emergencies like the community had that there are businesses and people that will take advantage of vulnerable people. (See Article: After Storms, Watch Out for Scams) Customers are beginning to see their power restored around the area. However, SWEPCO issued a release on Saturday, saying, “Despite power restored to more than 95 percent of nearly 250,000 Ark-La-Tex residents following last week’s supercell severe weather event, late Friday storms packed another punch to east Texas and temporarily added new outages.”

“…As a result, teams were mobilized and redeployed to hard-hit areas. Additionally, the base camp in Longview, Texas for forestry, distribution, transmission, and line crews was extended another day for focused efforts so teams can continue working together to help repower all areas in their latest push to return everyone to service.”

“Being without power is difficult. This supercell storm produced unprecedented damage across the Ark-La-Tex,” said SWEPCO President and COO Brett Mattison. “We’re so appreciative of all the crews who joined with us and to our community partners and customers. From all of us at SWEPCO, thank you for your patience and support as we continue to work to repower our communities. We aren’t stopping.”

As of 9:30 a.m. Saturday, SWEPCO reports show an estimated 10,697 customers were without power including 7,917 in Texas; 1,902 in Louisiana and 29 in Arkansas.

B owie Cass gave better news, “All outages related to the tornado and the damaging storms that followed it, have all been restored. The final outages were restored Friday evening, June 23rd.

“We are now in the process of doing storm clean up. We had multiple damaging storms over the span of a week, so as you can imagine, there is quite a bit of work to be done to recover from the storms. Our line crews will be busy ensuring that all line equipment and poles are in good shape and our right of way department will be busy surveying our right of ways to make sure they are clear.”

Lastly, some around the area may have noticed unusual- looking ambulances parked around the community. As a result of the disaster declaration, emergency medical personnel were in the county sent by the Texas Division of emergency management. The workers were here to assist those that were homebound, such as the elderly and vulnerable from a list sent by the county and reported to the utility companies. 110 visits were completed in a twoday period.

Additionally, a water, ice, and Meal, Ready-to-Eat package (MRE) station was setup to assist those in Hughes Springs that was impacted heavily by the storm.